Save the Texas Prairie Chicken
by ChaosKirin
Summary: Mike runs into a young man who seems to think he's a genie, and inadvertently makes a wish which leads to a rather severe feathery problem.
1. Chapter 1

Fourty-Two really had no idea what to do with himself, and he absolutely hated labels. Since being sacrificially and ceremonially re-assigned as a genie by The Boss, it felt particularly strange to even refer to himself as a demon anymore. The normal technicalities did exist, and at least he'd gotten to write the binding contract agreement (in his own blood, no less!) with his own version of old, tired rules, but calling himself a 'genie' just seemed old-fashioned.

"Djinn, maybe? Nah," he muttered to himself. Honestly, it wasn't something he wanted to ponder at all. As The Boss' first ever accidental non-malicious demon, he'd been assigned to a position where he could potentially cause at least a little mischief, with the stipulation that he had one wish to grant per day, and he absolutely had to grant it.

Oh, sure, there were other rules. The whole 'twist the words of these mere mortals, blah, blah, blah' thing, but Forty-Two wasn't sure he was cut out for that sort of career. He kind of liked 'em, after all. These humans were awfully interesting, so he could understand - to an extent - what The Boss wanted with their souls. But Forty-Two really just liked to watch them going on with their lives.

It was why he ended up taking the form he did. Looking into the dark glass window of a music store, he studied the reflection of a boy in his early teens. Sandy hair, blue eyes. The Boss approved of this particular appearance because it would catch the mortals off their guard. He looked so innocent, after all. Forty-Two just liked it because he kind of wanted to _be_ innocent. Studying himself, he smiled. How could anyone possibly look into his eyes and see an immortal, indestructible agent of Lucifer himself?

It was getting on in the evening, and he really needed to find someone to grant a wish to. Certainly he didn't want to fail on his very first day. Who knew what The Boss would do to him if he did? Therefore, when a young man walked out of the same music shop where Forty-Two admired his reflection, the young genie turned and followed after him.

"Hey! You, with the hat!"

The man looked over his shoulder, arching an eyebrow. Forty-Two stopped just behind him, looking way up into his quarry's dark eyes. "Hey, Mister."

"Hey, yourself, kid." The man smiled a little, turning fully around. "What're you doin' out here in the dark?" After a pause, he added. "Don't you know you ain't supposed to talk to strangers?"

"Oh. Well, what's your name?"

"It's Mike. Yours?"

"Forty-Two."

Mike removed the green wool hat, scratching the back of his head, peering down at the boy with confusion. "That's like a nickname or somethin'?"

The genie shook his head. "It's not either. That's my name."

The young man rolled his eyes, pulled that hat back onto his head, and started walking again. "Don't have time for games, kid. I gotta get home. And you should, too. It's late."

"Wait up, Mister! I— I got somethin' to tell you!" Forty-Two ran after him for a few steps, holding out his hand.

Mike stopped again, only to look over his shoulder. "Make it quick."

"I'm a genie! And I'm supposed to grant you a wish!"

Mike closed his eyes, sighed, and continued walking. "If you're a genie, I'm a Texas prairie chicken. Now git on home and quit talkin' to strangers."

"Wonder if that counts," the genie wondered to himself.

—-

Later that night, Michael felt weird.

It wasn't anything particular, just a sort of crawling feeling, starting in his feet and running through his bones all the way up to his head. He scratched at his temple, shifting in the chair as he read over want ads in the newspaper. Unfortunately, the music store wasn't going to pan out. Maybe his frustrations were finally getting to him, and they'd decided to give him panic attacks. After all, they needed money badly, given the fact that they'd been getting so few gigs lately, which hardly covered the cost of living.

Without having really read any words, he flipped to the next page, then dropped the paper and scratched at his hands. Something definitely didn't feel right.

"You okay?" Peter asked. "You've been fidgety all night."

"Might be gettin' sick," Mike muttered. He licked his lips. They felt dry.

"Oh," Peter replied. "Well, I'll make up some soup or somethin'."

Although Mike nodded, he really didn't want to see what kind of soup Peter would come up with, given the ingredients they had in the fridge. Mustard grape-jam chowder? Chocolate pudding-mayonnaise surprise? Too distracted to protest, Mike ran a hand through his hair, stopping when he felt something odd. When he pulled it out, it hurt.

In his hand was a single black feather.

"Didja go to the craft store?" Peter asked. "Was hopin' to get some beads and stuff to— "

Mike shook his head, getting to his feet. He licked his lips again, which were feeling less dry and more… solid? "Nah, I went to the music store. Tried to get a job, but he wanted someone more clean-cut. My hair was too long… Is it warm in here?"

As Mike walked past them, Micky and Davy stood from the kitchen table, leaving their game of cards behind as they watched Mike pace the floor. They looked at each other and shrugged.

He thought it may have been his imagination at first, but his hair felt softer, almost downy. Then he realized that the strands of his hair did actually seem to be fusing into feathers, and he pulled his hand back as if it were burned. "Guys, something's happening to me. I think I— " He continued talking, but eventually registered that the sound he was hearing wasn't his voice at all.

Micky took Mike by the shoulders, looking into his eyes. "…did you just hoot at me?"

Davy added, "His eyes are orange."

It wasn't long before Peter stood in front of him, as well, confused.

"Did I?" he asked. He tried to recall the sound he'd been making. Despite his attempt at saying words, he could honestly say that his voice did sound like a hoot of some kind. Dazed, he nodded weakly.

Feeling downright hot now, Mike brushed his hand across his forehead, which, by now, also seemed to be a little feathery. The other guys were backing away from him; in the moment he caught their glances, he could tell they were at least a little disturbed, if not completely freaked out by what was happening. Feeling unbalanced, he propped himself against the nearest wall with one hand as he noticed that he really didn't have fingers to speak of anymore… Actually, it looked like he was carrying around a fan made out of feathers, but he got the distinct impression that the fan was attached. To that end, his hand simply slid off the wall, and he stumbled, as if drunk, into it.

"I don't know what's…" he managed, but immediately stopped when he realized that he no longer had any teeth. Or maybe he did - he couldn't quite tell if he was running his tongue over his teeth or his lips. Wincing as his now-feathered shoulder rubbed up against the plaster, he righted himself again, standing, but only barely balanced. "H— hulp— " he managed, although by that point, his throat didn't seem capable of forming anymore words.

He wanted to ask the others if he was getting shorter, but the question was answered for him when he realized that he was looking _up_ at Davy.

Now at the edge of panic, he tried to turn toward the door so he could run away, but not only was he completely unbalanced at this point, but his clothes had become a hindrance. His half-twist only succeeded in tangling him completely, and as he fell to the floor, his shirt completely engulfed him, leaving him in relative darkness. He couldn't help flailing around in a blind panic for some time, but clarity finally returned, and, worn out, he ceased his struggles.

Stunned and completely lost, Mike sat inside his clothing for quite awhile. Judging by the billowy cloth around him, he'd become very small. This must have been a dream. It had to be.

It felt like many minutes passed before he heard Peter's soft, questioning voice close by. "Mike? Michael? Are you in there?"

Someone was pulling at the cloth.

He answered, but the vocal response was an odd sort of chitter. Eventually, Peter worked the collar of the shirt over him, and Mike found himself staring up at his friends. Way up.

And they all stared right back down at him, eyes wide. They looked at each other, and Michael, though a little wobbly, got to his feet.

"He's so cute," Micky said.

Despondent, Mike stretched out what were supposed to be his arms, which were, of course, no longer arms. He glanced back and forth at them, trying to process the fact that he wasn't observing an animal, but himself. Black feathers. Black feathers. Texas prairie chickens weren't black. As he looked at the rest of himself, he discovered that instead of the usual barred pattern, his feathers were the same shade of near-black as his hair was. Furthermore, as he studied himself, he caught a glimpse of his feet, craning his neck so he could get a better view. Chicken feet. Little chicken feet, with wicked-looking talons.

He really wasn't hip to being a chicken. Why couldn't he have said something like 'if you're a genie, I'm a Bengal tiger'?

"Lookit, 'e's even got green spots on 'im the same color as his hat," Davy said, with a laugh. Mike looked up at him, attempting to glare at the Englishman's grin, but he couldn't really make his face work how he wanted it to. So he narrowed his eyes as much as he could, enough so that the expression vanished from his bandmate's face. "Think he remembers who we are?"

"Yeah, probably," Micky said. "Look at that look he's givin' you."

Peter was the only one not smiling. Leaning down to Mike's eye level, he asked, "Are you all right, Mike?"

Mike bobbed his head once. He attempted to say that he was as well as could be expected, but all he could do was hoot again. Micky and Davy chuckled.

"Don't laugh, guys," Peter said, then added, "He says he's as well as can be expected."

Three pairs of eyes stared at him. It was finally Micky who asked, "You talk to animals?"

Peter nodded. "Yeah, of course."

"Well, y'never told us," Davy said. "How were we s'posed to know?"

Peter shrugged. "It never came up. Besides. It's usually stuff like, 'feed me,' or 'pet me.' Not really interesting. But, you know, if Mike's a chicken, I'm sure this'll come in handy."

((_Who talks to animals?_)) Mike asked, incredulously.

Micky pointed to him. "There! There, what'd he say?"

"Well, he just wants to know who talks to animals." Beaming, Peter pointed to his chest. "I do."

Despite having wings instead of hands, Mike reached up to rub his face. This wasn't happening. This couldn't be happening. Not to him. It was a very small comfort that he could be understood, but the question was, how the heck was he going to fix this mess? Apparently the kid he'd run into really was what he claimed. ((_The kid I met. He was tryin' to prove something,_)) he chittered, waiting for Peter to translate. ((_We gotta go find him. He was outside Fort Street Music._))

"Some kid did this?" Micky asked, after Peter translated.

((_He said he was a genie. His name's Forty-Two._))

Peter relayed this.

"Well, that explains everything then, don't it?" Davy said sarcastically, rolling his eyes and crossing his arms.

"Forty-Two," Micky muttered.

((_Yeah, I dunno, man,_)) Mike said. ((_I thought he was playin' with me, so I… Well, I went and said somethin' stupid. Now here I am._))

"You think he'd still be in that area?" Davy asked.

((_I told 'im to go home. But if he's some kinda genie…_)) He paused, waiting for Peter to catch up with his translation. ((_He may not have a home to go back to._))

"Worth a try?" Micky asked.

Davy and Peter nodded.

Micky reached for Mike, and before the musician-turned-chicken could protest, he found himself in the drummer's arms, tucked in the crook of one elbow. After kicking his feet a bit and finding that Micky wasn't letting go, he sighed and settled down.

Mike looked up, fluffing up his feathers involuntarily when he saw the grin on Micky's face. Well. At least being carried was probably a much more efficient way to travel.

Didn't mean he had to be happy about it.


	2. Chapter 2

Micky quickly noticed that Michael had ceased all struggling as they walked, and looked down to see the chicken's head sort of squished down near his body. Maybe he couldn't make proper facial expressions at the moment, but he sure looked sad.

Shifting a little bit so they could see each other better, Micky asked, "You okay, Mike?"

The chicken tilted its head, one orange eye meeting Micky's hazel. He nodded.

Micky stopped, and a second later, Davy and Peter did, too, looking back. The curly-haired young man waved them along. "You two go on, me and Mike'll catch up in a sec. I gotta have a chat with our fearless leader."

"Yeah, but… How're you gonna know what he's saying?" Peter argued.

Micky waved him on again. "Don't worry, we'll play twenty questions if we gotta. You two go. We'll meet you there."

"All right…" Davy began, checking his watch. "Don't take too long. It's after midnight. If we're gonna catch a kid out here, well, it's already pretty late."

Michael chirped, and Peter said, "Genie."

"Whatever. Just be careful, both of ya." Turning, he gave Peter's elbow a pat, and the two of them started off down the block again.

Micky sat down, leaning his back against the wall of a nearby shop, and put Mike on his knees. The prairie chicken tottered back and forth a little, flinging his wings out for balance, before he finally settled down. "Talk about your chicken-scratch handwriting," Micky said. "Whaddaya call someone who _speaks_ in chicken?"

He felt a talon dig into his skin briefly, and quickly added, "Okay, no more jokes. I'm sorry. Look. We've known each other for years, right?"

Mike nodded.

"And me and you and Davy and Peter, we're all best friends, yeah? So you know that it's okay to not be okay, right?"

Another nod.

"Mike, are you okay?"

After a long hesitation, the chicken shook his head.

"No, not okay then." Leaning forward until his nose was just a couple inches away from Mike's beak, he studied the strangely intelligent expression in those orange eyes. It was kind of hard to believe his friend was in that feathery body, and even harder to figure out how to comfort a chicken. Tentatively, he placed his hand on Mike's shoulder, which was a whole lot smaller now. "Well, we'll get you out of there. You believe me, right?"

Michael clucked, then slumped, apparently remembering that talking was pretty useless at the moment.

"With reservations," Micky supplied, and earned a nod.

"Well, I dunno how we're gonna do it, either, but come on. We've been in worse stuff than this before. I mean, if you think about it, it can't get much worse than trying to break a deal with the devil."

The chicken thought about this for a moment, then offered a tiny nod.

"Besides," Micky said, quickly scratching behind Michael's ear tufts before he could duck out of the way. "Look at how adorable you are. I mean, come on— Hey!"

Quicker than Micky could blink, Michael had darted forward and bitten Micky's nose, right between the eyes. Startled, Micky sat back up, reaching for his face. When his hand came away spotted red, he looked down at his fowl friend and noted the smug look in the chicken's eyes. "Well, y'are," Micky said. "Fluffy."

Michael said something which Micky couldn't interpret, but he got the idea that it was something rude and unrepeatable. After rubbing his nose again, he said, "I mean it, Mike, we're gonna fix this. It'll be all right."

Another nod.

"Right. C'mon, you can sit on my shoulder. Little more dignified than being carried." Carefully, he picked the chicken up off his knees and set him on a shoulder. It took some adjusting, and Mike ended up with one wing draped completely over Micky's head. Consequently, it really didn't end up working out too well.

"There's somethin' wrong here…" Micky said, one eye peeking out from between feathers. "Try, uh. This is gonna sound weird, but if you curl your toes a little…"

Mike looked down at his feet, still hanging onto Micky's head with a wing. Carefully lifting one foot up, he wiggled his toes, then flexed his entire foot into a fist.

"Yeah! Like that. You just kinda hang on like that. But don't, you know. Don't injure me. I'm delicate." Micky bit his lip as Mike found a better grip on his shoulder - carefully - and then slowly removed the safety net that was his wing. Tucking it back at his side, he leaned inward, meeting Micky's eye again. Balance, it seemed, had been achieved, all without lacerating any skin.

"Rrk?" Mike asked.

"I think that's okay," Micky replied.

Mike gestured forward with a wing, and Micky started out slowly, one tiny step at a time at first, before it seemed that Michael the chicken was taking to this new parrot act pretty well. He picked up his pace until he'd returned to a normal walk, and Michael, having achieved at least a little something, looked a little happier because of it. Sure, Micky couldn't imagine that his bandmate was at all ecstatic about the situation, but doing something was a whole lot better than wallowing in misery.

"Just you wait. Next, we'll have you flying," Micky said as they turned onto Fort Street. He assumed the low sound he heard from the chicken was a laugh.

Not long after, they caught up with Davy and Peter, who were searching the area for the kid. They hadn't seen anyone, having been up and down the street and partway around the next block.

"Where'd you meet him, Mike?" Davy asked.

Mike replied, and Peter spoke for him. "It was right here, in front of the store. He was thirteen or fourteen. Blond hair and blue eyes."

Without thinking, Micky reached up to scritch under the chicken's chin, who chirped again. Peter immediately relayed, "Don't do that."

Micky pulled his hand away, muttering an apology. "Uh, look, I got a good question. Why would you wish to be a chicken in the first place?"

Michael answered, and Peter said, "What he said was, 'if you're a genie, then I'm a Texas prairie chicken.'"

"Doesn't sound much like a wish," Davy said, eyebrows lowering.

Michael warbled softly.

"Tell me about it," Peter said.

"Gee, I wish we could find this kid— " Davy statement was cut off when the exact child for which they'd been searching appeared directly in their midst in a puff of sparkly blue fog. Davy nearly fell over himself, and only remained standing thanks to Peter catching him under the arms.

As the boy brushed glitter off his worn t-shirt and smiled up at them, Micky noted that the kid didn't seem particularly imposing. At the same time, Michael started shrieking, gesturing angrily with his wings until he lost his balance. Micky managed to catch him before he hit the pavement.

"Slow down, Mike!" Peter said. "I can't translate that fast! Uh… You little rat… you— Well, the gist is, he'd like you to repair the damage now, kid."

"Huh? Damage?"

A low growl came from the chicken, whose crest was now raised in what could only be a display of anger. This time, Mike didn't protest as Micky stroked his neck to calm him down.

"Yeah, damage," Davy repeated. "You don't actually think he wants to be a chicken, do you?"

One thing Micky was good at was determining a person's character. He'd always had a sort of talent for picking out the good people from the bad people, and genuine from fake. He could tell the young boy was blustering, putting on a tough face.

"He wished for it. He said that if I was a genie, he was a chicken. So I made it true."

"Yeah, but— " Davy began to protest, but the boy held out a hand to silence him.

"Look, I don't care how the wish is made, I just grant em. One wish per day. If someone's dumb enough to wish they were a chicken, I don't are how they say it."

"How does this whole wish thing work, anyway?" Micky asked. "I mean, it's not as if Mike rubbed a magic lamp or something. This isn't exactly _I Dream of Genie._"

Uttering a long-suffering sigh, which seemed too grown-up to come from a kid so young, the boy explained. "My name is Forty-Two. I'm a demon. My job is to grant one wish per day… Doesn't matter how it's asked, or why, or… Or anything!" Petulantly, he pouted, crossing his arms.

Davy blinked, and he quickly looked at the others. A demon? "You mean like Zero?" Davy asked. In Micky's arms, Michael shuddered; they all did.

But Forty-Two, stunned, took a step back. "You can't say his name! He might _hear you!_ No, he's _the_ demon. Me, I'm just _a_ demon. A genie, djinn, whatever you want to call it. You know, we gotta keep things interesting up here on earth… We all have different assignments, like some collect souls, and some sow chaos! That's my job!"

He looked awfully pleased with himself.

"Yeah, but Mike doesn't want to be like this. He wants to be himself again." Peter took Mike from Micky. The chicken had calmed down, and rolled his eyes up to look at Peter.

"Why does he care?" Forty-Two asked. "Now he doesn't have to do anything. He can just sit around all day."

Peter stepped forward, hugging Mike close as if he were a teddy bear. Several quiet clucks suggested that the former guitarist didn't exactly appreciate being held that way, but he stayed mostly quiet. "Mike's a musician, sir— "

"Whaddaya mean, 'sir,' Peter! He's younger'n you are!" Davy protested. "And 'e's shorter than I am."

"You really think that, Davy?" Peter asked.

Davy regarded the boy again, and Micky saw him in a new light. Forty-Two was a demon, which meant he probably wasn't really a child. When neither Davy nor Micky said anything, Peter continued.

"He's a singer, and he played the guitar, and he really enjoys doing that stuff, so if you could just change him back…"

"He… He plays the guitar?" the boy asked. Micky noted that the tough-guy act was slowly melting away.

"Yeah, he's really good at it."

Proudly, Mike puffed up his feathers.

Forty-Two's eyes met Michael's, and the boy said, "There's just… There are rules."

"Rules? You're a demon," Micky said. "Just snap your fingers and fix it."

The boy bit his lip. "Do you know how crazy it would be on earth if demons weren't bound by angels? I mean, we … I guess we serve a purpose of balance, but we're bound by rules. And these rules are agreed upon by one angel and one demon, and before you say anything, the same goes for angels. They can't go around… scattering their sparkle dust everywhere without some sort of agreement."

Davy reached out, brushing another few specks of glitter off Forty-Two's shoulder. "Looks like you're the one with the sparkle issues."

The boy brush Davy's hand away. "Now, look, I'm tryin' ta tell ya!"

"Go ahead," Peter encouraged.

"One. I can only grant one wish a day. Two. Each mortal is authorized to one wish per century of life."

"So… We each get a wish, too?" Micky asked hopefully.

Forty-Two gestured to him and Peter. "You two do. Mike already made his, and so did this guy." He pointed to Davy, who was about to protest… Then covered his face.

"I wished we could find 'im."

"Ooh, you're a sneaky little guy, aren't you?" Micky asked. "Anyway, I'll just use my wish to wish Mike back to normal."

Mike seemed to perk up, and Peter, in preparation for this, set him back down on the ground. But Forty-Two didn't do anything.

Eventually, hesitantly, he said, "The angel's binding says that I can't grant any wishes that would directly affect a person other than the one making the wish. It … it could only affect you. I'm sorry, there's no way to fix your friend. And even if I could, I've already granted my wish for the day by appearing. I'm… I'm really sorry."

No one said anything. Michael stood completely still on the sidewalk, and Peter knelt down next to him. Micky and Davy were staring at the boy; finally, Micky asked, "Well, can't you make an exception this one time? I mean, if it's an angel, they'll understand why you're— "

"_There are RULES_," Forty-Two said, as if this was the only argument he should have to make. "Look, if the angels were allowed to let demons like me bend the bindings, there couldn't be balance. It's my job to create chaos. If I could just take it back every time I felt bad about something…"

"Do you? Feel bad about it?" Peter asked. He had his hand on Michael's back. The chicken still hadn't moved.

Forty-Two nodded.

"So you'd tell us if there was something we could do," Davy said.

"Yeah. I would," the boy replied. "Look. It was my first day, I had to impress The Boss. He was thrilled, if it makes you feel better. He said if I ever saw you again, to tell you that the score's settled, whatever that means."

"Doesn't make us feel better," Davy said.

"Still, it's good to know that we're even-Steven with Satan," Micky muttered. "You guys, I think we better get home."

"Hey! We can't just give up!" Peter said. He picked Mike up again, alarmed. "We can't just go home and not do anything!"

With Mike out of commission, Micky felt like someone should take charge, at least for the time being. With Peter and Davy looking at _him,_ he figured he might as well take a stab at it. With a quick look at his watch, he said, "It's almost two o'clock in the morning. If there's anything that can be done, it's not going to happen tonight."

They turned, leaving the genie behind them, standing dumbstruck in front of the music store.


	3. Chapter 3

None of them really slept well, least of all Michael, who'd dragged a blanket behind Micky's drum kit and just sat there all night.

For the past while, Peter had just been standing across the living room, keeping watch. There wasn't much he could do for Michael, who'd been quietly vocalizing for some time. Still, if the poor guy wanted someone to talk to, Peter wanted to be nearby.

It was sometime in the early AM that Micky tapped him on the shoulder, eyes still bleary from sleep. "Pete, what's he been saying? He's been over there talking for hours."

The only way Peter could convey the answer was to meet Micky's eyes, subtly shaking his head. He couldn't keep the hurt out of his expression, he was sure, because he was too tired to try. Besides that, Peter really wasn't all that good at hiding what he was feeling. For a moment, the drummer didn't seem to get it, but then the look of understanding crossed his face. No one wanted to say it out loud.

Mike was crying.

"I'm just … I'm just gonna go back upstairs," Micky muttered.

Peter sighed, turning away from the bay window and heading into the kitchen. Searching through the fridge brought up several heels from various loaves of bread, and while they were probably stale by now, Mike probably wouldn't mind. Then, searching for a clean bowl, he filled it with water. He was tired of letting Mike feel sorry for himself.

Crossing the living room, he sat down next to the blanket. His chicken friend had buried himself completely in it, leaving only a few black feathers poking out.

"Michael," Peter said. "C'mon, Mike, you've been hiding for hours. I got you something to eat."

The lump in the blanket shifted, and the miserable-looking green-spotted face appeared, warily eying the half dozen pieces of undesirable bread in the blond's hand. ((_I don't want it, Peter. Leave me be._))

"It's not that bad. Maybe a… little moldy— We'll just throw out this piece here…" Making a face, Peter tossed the worst of the slices aside. "Come on."

((_Y'know what it's like to know you'll never be able to play the guitar again? Ain't like losin' a girl. It's like losin' a part of yourself, just gone. Now I don't got that, or my singin', or my humanity. So leave me be._))

Setting the bowl and the bread on the floor, Peter drew his knees up, wrapping his arms around them and facing the ocean as the sky got lighter. For awhile, Mike continued to make soft cooing sounds that meant nothing except the fact that he was upset and had no other way to express it. Even that passed, though, and the room fell silent.

The blanket stirred again, and Mike worked his way out of it. Ignoring the bread and water, he took two steps, and sat down next to Peter.

((_Never had nothin' like this before._))

"I know, Mike."

((_I didn't know what else to do. Just needed some time to get it outta my system._))

They watched the sky grow lighter, and sat there as a boat, way far out in the ocean, passed from one side of the bay window to the other, then disappeared. They heard Davy wake up at some point and head to the kitchen, before going up the stairs to join Micky.

((_Why couldn't this've happened to Micky? He probably would have thought it was cool,_)) Mike said. ((_…Ain't nice of me to say. Wouldn't wish this on anyone._))

"Well, we all handle things different," Peter said. "You're right, Micky probably would be loving it. I bet he'd be off flying by now." Leaning down a little, he rested his cheek on his knee, smiling at Michael. "Bet it'd be fun if you tried it. I mean, how many people get the chance to fly?"

((_I don't want to be reminded that I'm a damn bird._)) He glanced at the small stack of bread slices again. ((_It's bad enough that I'm starving and I'm gonna have t'figure out how to eat. I don't need to be out enjoyin' myself, too._))

Stretching out his legs, Peter flipped over onto his belly, lying on the floor. He reached for a slice of bread, tearing it into tiny pieces. "Just 'cuz you're having a little fun doesn't mean you can't keep looking for a cure," he said. Pulling a corner of Mike's blanket over, he set the bread pieces on it, so they weren't directly on the floor. "Life's what you make of it. You're in a bad situation now, but I bet it won't be bad forever."

((_You heard what the kid said. This is permanent. I can't undo it._)) Mike stood, holding out a wing to poke at the crumbs. When he was unsuccessful at picking any of them up, he tried balancing on one foot while using the other one to grasp. Unfortunately, he couldn't keep his balance, and abandoned that idea, too. Sighing, he visibly slumped.

"He said _he_ couldn't undo it. Not that it couldn't be undone." Peter picked up a piece of bread and held it out.

Mike tried to take it in his beak, but immediately dropped it, and swore. ((_Maybe you could wish for an instruction book for me, then,_)) he grumbled. Peter picked the piece up again, and held it out. This time, Mike was successfully able to hang onto it.

"I kinda thought I'd save my wish for when we exhausted all our options. Then I could wish to be a chicken, too, and you wouldn't be so upset." He picked up another piece and held it out, but Michael had gone still again, and didn't take it.

((_Pete… You don't have to do that._))

"I know. But I was watching you earlier, and I think I'd be okay with it. I'd feel better if I knew you had someone around who could… you know. Relate to. Uh… What's the word…"

Mike pressed the top of his head against Peter's arm. ((_You're a good friend, Peter. If I could hug you right now, I would._))

"Eh, I wouldn't worry too much about it. We're gonna find a way to fix this. Now c'mon, you said you were starving."

It didn't take too long for Mike to get the hang of eating. He also seemed to be feeling a little bit better as he did so. Definitely not as grouchy. But that was Mike… He'd told Peter once a long time ago that if something bad happened, it was okay to be upset about it. But eventually you had to pick yourself up and keep moving forward. You couldn't change the past. And while Peter thought that was good advice and all, he had to admit - despite all he'd said, what happened to Michael was one of the worst things he'd ever seen happen to anyone. In a lot of ways, it was worse than death, especially if it couldn't be fixed. Who would ever believe that this small fowl was a human being? Even Peter would have had a hard time believing it if he hadn't seen it happen. That in mind, he thought that his formerly-human friend was dealing with it all quite well.

Once Mike had managed to eat a couple slices of bread, he waddled over to the dish of water. ((_I don't even know how I'm gonna…_)) he began, looking into it.

"When I see the ducks drinking, they always tilt the heads up," Peter said, tipping his head back to demonstrate. "Like this."

But Mike wasn't looking. He was staring into the water. After awhile, he finally said, ((_That's what I look like, huh?_)) He tilted his head, turning back and forth to get a good look at his reflection. ((_Guess I'm pretty handsome for a chicken._))

Peter rolled his eyes.

((_What? Come on, man. I'm beautiful. You're the one who was suggesting I should have fun, or find good in this or whatever._)) He continued looking at himself for a long time, and Peter didn't say anything. There'd been something about Mike's tone that suggested he found it all to be a lot stranger than what he was letting on.

Finally backing away from the bowl, he muttered, ((_Maybe I'll try tackling drinking later._))

"I'll just leave the bowl here. No one'll bother it."

((_Pete? Can you call Micky and Davy down here? I think it's time we talked about this an' what we're gonna do about it._))

"You sure?" Peter asked, getting to his feet. When he was standing at his full height, Mike seemed so tiny.

((_No, but. I felt sorry for myself long enough. Nothin's gonna get done if I sit over here all day. If nothin' else, it'll take my mind off me bein' so helpless._))

Peter shuffled over to the stairway, looking up for a moment, before turning his attention back to Mike, who nodded. ((_Pete, I'll be fine._))

Reassured, Peter smiled, calling up the stairs. "Micky! Davy! C'mon, Mike wants to have a meeting."

Mike, meanwhile, hopped down the stairs to the bandstand. Since the previous day, walking seemed easier, even if it still looked a bit awkward; at least he could make his way across the living room without any difficulty. As their two other housemates thundered down the stairs, Mike hopped up onto the coffee table and Peter took a seat on the couch.

"Doin' okay, Mike?" Micky asked as he passed by the table, plopping down into one of the chairs, as Davy sat in the other one.

Mike hooted a yes in reply. Micky was unable to hide the smile that followed, but he did at least try. When Peter gave him a dirty look, he turned his eyes to the floor. "Look, I'm sorry, guys. It's… I know it's a big deal, but can't you at least admit it's a little funny? Please, Mike? I'll feel a lot less guilty."

Mike replied, and Micky looked at Peter. "What'd he say? What was that?"

Peter chuckled into his sleeve, then said, "He says that if he can find it funny that you're taking orders from a tiny prairie bird, you can have a laugh once in a while."

Micky seemed to ponder this, got out of his chair, and crouched down next to the table, holding out a hand. "Deal."

Balancing on one foot (which drew another chuckle from Micky), Mike used the other to shake on it.

With Micky back in the chair, Mike said, ((_Peter, can you go ahead and translate for me?_))

"Yeah, no problem."

((_So, we got a couple problems. And before i get to the biggest one, there's the matter of payin' our rent. We got some options. There's a club in town that does two-person acts a couple times a week._))

Micky slouched a little, and Peter knew why. Rather than make Micky bring it up himself, Peter said, "Mike, there's no room for a drummer there."

((_It'd be you and Davy, Peter._))

Davy looked like he wanted to say something, but bit his lip, looking away. With Peter and Micky sitting in stunned silence, Mike continued. ((_Look, I ain't breakin' us up. This is temporary and necessary. I dunno how long-term this is gonna be, and we need to book what we can. You know Babbitt. If we're late on our rent, he'll come on up here, and the last thing we need is for him to see me hangin' around. There's also the matter of eating._))

"You said there were options. Plural," Micky said.

((_Y'all go out and get a day job._)) As this seemed scarier to the others than breaking up the band - even temporarily - Mike was quick to continue. ((/We've done it before. And if you all make minimum wage with at least ten hours a week, we should be able to … well. We'll keep a roof over our heads, anyway. That's half the rent, and it's enough to keep Babbitt happy.))

"Look, us singin' without you, and without… well, without all of us," Micky started, looking at the others. Davy was still looking away, apparently inattentive. "…it doesn't feel right. So if I gotta go out and get a job, I'll do it."

"Me, too," Peter said.

They waited for Davy to say something similar, but he didn't. Micky stood up, waving a hand in front of the shorter boy's face. "Hey, you with us, or what?"

"Uh…" Davy finally managed to glance at Mike, then quickly at Micky. "I… I can't— "

((_Can't?_)) Michael said.

Peter did his best to make the translation sound as borderline-incredulous as Mike had done. He wasn't sure he was successful.

Davy's lips twisted in what may have been the beginning of a grimace, but he quickly looked at the floor, uncomfortable. "It's the whole situation. And it's makin' me feel terrible. I mean, really, really bad."

"Then do somethin'," Micky said.

"You don't get it."

((_Enlighten us._))

Davy said nothing at first, then everything he'd been holding back poured out at once, as one long run-on statement. "It was serious last night, so I was worried, but then I got to thinkin' how ridiculous the whole thing is, and, jeez, all I could think about was how funny it was that Mike of all people had this happen to him, because you know, it's Mike, and he's usually pretty conservative and all, and it's easy enough to pretend it's not funny when I'm not in the same room with you, but now I'm here, and you're there, and all I want to do is laugh, because it's the most hilarious thing that I've ever seen, which makes me feel horrible, because I'd never laugh at you, Mike, not ever, you know that, right?"

After a confession like that, no one was sure what to say.

((_That's what you're worried about?_))

Davy nodded.

((_Well, hell, son. I just got finished sayin' it was funny. If we can't have a laugh at our own expense once in awhile, what good are we? Look at you guys, sittin' around me, hangin' onto my every word. I'm a chicken, for cryin' out loud. I'd laugh at you if I could._))

Micky leaned over the table between him and Davy and whispered, loud enough for the others to hear, "He won't think so when he finds out I'm gonna be calling him 'Fluffy' 'til we get him back to normal."

((_You ain't. Now stop that._))

Davy finally smiled, either chuckling in relief or at the absurdity of the situation. "Speakin' o' gettin' you back to normal…"

As luck would have it, at that exact moment, someone knocked on the door. It seemed like everyone's first thought was that it must have been their landlord, because the three boys all split in different directions at the same time. Micky hurried to pick up the few black feathers that had found their way onto the floor, Peter went to clean up Mike's nest over by the bay window, and Davy picked Mike up (who fluttered in surprise, causing more feathers to appear on the floor for Micky to clean up) and shoved him under the chair.

By that time, Micky was looking through the port window in the door. "Relax, guys. It's not Babbitt."

Davy stood again, and Mike crawled out from under the chair, just as the drummer opened the door to reveal Forty-Two standing just outside.


	4. Chapter 4

When the dream decided to play itself out, it always seemed to happen the exact same way, with stunning clarity, as if it had been recorded. The mind it chose to haunt slept deeply as it recalled every single detail of the day everything had changed.

Much younger then, she ran through the freezing rain, ignoring the fact that the snow came up to her shins. This was Russia; anyone who couldn't make their way through a decent snowfall was ultimately doomed to failure of an epic degree. Katalina had a bit of an advantage over her pursuers, though, since she'd been relying on her knowledge of the streets for so long, she knew exactly where to go to escape.

That was good. Very good. If they caught her, she knew they'd kill her. It didn't particularly matter if she was a kid.

There were caves outside the town, which she'd spent the last summer mapping out in her mind. They weren't particularly complicated, but there were enough places in them to hide where she wouldn't be bothered. Of course, one detail stuck out in the back of her mind, one little persistent thought - that the thugs who were chasing her might just know the layout of these caves, too. It would be her luck.

Still, she reached the old, dead elm, turned directly left, fled a few more steps, and then started digging through the snow as if her life depended on it.

Stupid. Stupid. They'd see her tracks!

Too late to give up now.

Eventually, she found what she'd been looking for and wiggled through the opening. On the other side, there was a small drop, which she always found disorienting but painless. Righting herself and taking a moment to appreciate the relative warmth of the location compared with the gusty near-zero temperatures outside, she continued to run.

The dream always got a little fuzzy here, but it made sense. Enclosed and chased, Katalina only felt an all-encompassing sense of dread and panic. Somehow, she made it through the cave's natural passageways and hid herself in a hole. She didn't care that it was full of runoff from last week's melt, or that the water that came up to her ankles was causing her toes to go numb. As long as she stayed quiet, they couldn't possibly find her here. It was too far off the main chamber and they'd be in too much of a hurry. Plus, they wouldn't have lights, and it was awfully dark over here. So dark, that she couldn't see her hand in front of her eyes.

"Hey, you really should knock before barging into someone's home."

The fact that she couldn't tell if the voice was male or female made her uneasy. As well, it was in English, which was only secondary to her own Russian. Some of the more complicated words stumped her.

"Barged?" she asked.

"You runnin' from something, kid?"

She nodded. "Stole from them. I had to. Was no other way. You must keep quiet, or they'll find me."

"You want to escape?"

She heard the echoes of footsteps, far away at the moment. But they'd come closer, and if she was still talking, they'd surely hear her. "You must keep quiet!" she hissed. Peering out from the hole, she looked for an escape - some other place to hide, away from the irritation who'd already claimed her best hope. "If only I were someone else."

"Someone else! Hah."

Finding no other place to go, she drew back into the turtle shell-like depression, glaring in the direction of the chatterbox. "A different look. To be someone else. I could walk out of here and they'd never know it was me."

"You wish it?"

"With all of heart."

"Granted."

Suddenly, she felt strange, her whole body warming to nearly unbearable levels. Suddenly glad for the frigid water at her feet, she splashed it on herself, but it did nothing to relieve the feeling, which radiated from her chest, to her limbs and her face. Very subtle changes followed, which were not completely uncomfortable, except in one particular location. Clutching her abdomen just below her stomach, she gritted her teeth, fighting to keep from crying out. Somehow, she managed to remain silent as something inside her twisted and shifted in a most painful fashion.

She could feel her clothes changing, too. The heavy wool she'd been wearing became some sort of short-sleeved shirt and light pants ensemble, just as the warmth dissipated. Suddenly freezing, she shivered uncontrollably, accidentally splashing in the water that was now surrounding sandaled feet.

"Over here!" a voice said in Russian.

No, no, no…

A face appeared at the hole, and a moment later, the man it belonged to shined a flashlight directly into her face. A burly hand reached in, grabbed her by the collar, and hauled her out. Katalina expected to be immediately dispatched, only hoping that the deed was done quickly and mercifully. Instinctively, she threw one arm over her head, tightly closing her eyes with the dismal anticipation of her own end, hoping that her family wouldn't worry too much when she never came home.

"Boss, it's just some kid," the man said.

Daring a glance, Kat opened her eyes, gazing directly into the barrel of a gun. Beyond that, the confused, ice-blue eyes of one of the thugs who'd been chasing her stared downward warily. Could her wish have been granted? Did she really look unrecognizable to them? She chanced a weak smile.

A moment later, another man joined the first. He was large, intimidating; dark brown eyes met hers and softened into something much less threatening. "What are you doing hiding here, you little baby-face?" he asked, crouching down and removing the coat from his shoulders. He covered her with it, and her smile came stronger. When she muttered her thanks, she could tell that her voice was different. Something about it seemed disturbing to her, though.

The large man asked her another question. "Did you see a girl run by? About your age? She was pretty bundled up."

Taking the opportunity, she nodded and gestured further into the cave. Her hand definitely looked different.

"Find her," the man said, and the first thug who'd pulled her out of the hole immediately took off.

"Let's get you somewhere dry." He helped her up, which caused her to notice there was something a bit off about herself. Something she hadn't been able to explain when she'd been engulfed by pain. "You will call me Uncle Kolya. One day, you will make up this favor to me. Come, son."

She looked back at the hole, desperately searching for the other fugitive, but no one else was there.

—-

Babyface awoke with a start, gritting his teeth and sitting up on the uncomfortable bed. With no windows in his cell, he could never tell if it was day or night, but that didn't matter at the moment. Every time he was sure he'd conquered his anger, the dream would return and remind him of that night, of his stupid decision, of Kolya and the years that followed where he was brought up as the man's son.

It wasn't until very recently that Babyface understood what had happened to him in the cave. Far from simply altering his features, the other person hiding alongside him had taken the appearance of someone else entirely and copied it, right down to gender. As his crime legend grew, he also studied the phenomenon, coming to the conclusion that the creature he'd found in the cave was some sort of lesser demon - a djinn - and following that, Babyface dedicated his life to locating another. By this point, it wasn't even about getting his life back. He'd been this way for years, after all, and had no desire to completely destroy everything he'd worked hard to achieve by taking on his former appearance. This was about revenge.

Since coming face to face with the boy from which he'd been copied, Babyface couldn't help feeling an affection toward him. After all, they'd both been wronged by the demon in a way, even if Micky didn't really understand it at all. After their meeting, his underlings had asked if they should dispose of the lookalike, an offer which Babyface refused. The only one at fault was the djinn, honestly.

Vengeance, however, couldn't be exacted from inside a prison cell. Thankfully, breaking out was Babyface's specialty, and he never did it the same way twice. It was always a challenge, something with which to tease his mind and keep himself sane.

Standing, he approached the mirror over his sink, staring into it for a long time. The dream always did this to him - made him wonder what he'd look like if he did actually grow up as he was born. He imagined he'd be pretty, maybe. Not like this flat-faced man he'd become. Hell, he didn't even like smiling because it always looked so goofy. Still, he appreciated his face, embraced it, even. Saw it as the ultimate disguise, even if it meant he could never see his family again. Maybe they were already dead and buried anyway.

As he stared at himself, someone approached the bars of his cell.

"I don't know how you did it," the officer said, opening the door. "I know it was you, though."

Despite how he hated smiling, Babyface spared one for his own reflection, before turning his attention to the uniformed man. "From prison? Please. Tell me more."

But the officer looked unamused, and unwilling to discuss the finer points of Babyface's release. It didn't matter; villains always had a plan. This one simply involved paying off the right people. Innocence, it turned out, was pretty easy to buy if you knew who to turn to.

"Let's go. Haven't got all night."

Ah, so it _was_ night. Seemed fitting. Maybe this was why he had the dream tonight - release meant that he could continue his search. He simply needed a little inspiration, a little renewal of that old rage that always existed in his heart. If he had a heart. Some people said he didn't. Taking his time, he stepped past the guard, hands in the pocket of his striped prison jumpsuit. "My boys here?"

"Yeah. Outside. Stupid, if you ask me."

"They haven't done nothin'. You go ahead and drag 'em in here, see what happens." Despite himself, he had to smile again. "Go on, then. Lead me to the exit of this dump."

Wordlessly, the guard led on.

—-

"Nice of you to relinquish your command," Babyface said, patting Tony on the cheek. His second didn't seem particularly amused by this turn of events, although he certainly had a hand in making it happen. It was amazing how, despite how much all the underlings despised him, they still went out of their way to free him. Perhaps his ability to instill fear had more influence than he previously thought.

Dressed comfortably now, he stretched out his legs, reclining in Tony's favorite chair. Tony stood nearby, glowering but silent, and just to rub it all in, Babyface closed his eyes and sighed contentedly. Being free sure felt nice.

"So, what's been goin' on? Anything I should know about?" The criminal mastermind opened one eye, folding his hands behind his head.

"Somethin' strange happening the other night is all," Tony replied. "Been keepin' tabs on that kid that looks like you. Don't know why you won't just let us rub him out. It would make things a lot less… complicated."

Suddenly irritated, Babyface sat up, pointing at his second. "'cuz I said so. That's why. You ask me about it again, and you'll find _yourself_ six feet under. Now, what's strange?"

Tony's jaw set. The man had a temper, that was for damn sure. He'd spill his secret when he was ready, though. Boredly, Babyface leaned back in the chair again, repeating his previous ritual of sighing in contentment and closing his eyes. The world could wait at the moment, as far as he was concerned, because he was free of that damn hellhole and he meant to enjoy it.

"They had this chicken with 'em."

"Nothin' weird about a chicken."

"Look, Boss, I'm tryin' to say…" Tony fiddled with the brim of his hat, before nervously rubbing his hands together. Information generally didn't come cheap in this trade, but here was Tony, volunteering it at no charge to the one man he despised more than any other. That was Power, Babyface thought, at Tony collected himself. "They had a chicken with 'em, and I think it was the tall one. The one from Texas."

"The chicken was? Come on, Tony." Despite his dismissive words, Babyface felt his stomach do a flip-flop. Dare he hope?

"We think we found what you was lookin' for, boss. This other kid with them called himself a demon. Said something about granting wishes."

Yawning, Babyface waved one hand. "Good job, Tony. Get the others together."

They had some work to do.


	5. Chapter 5

Fourty-Two stood at the door, wringing his hands. He stared up at Micky with a puppy-like expression of pure innocence, the kind that said 'I know I did something wrong, but you still love me, right?' The only difference between this particular demon and a puppy was that puppies normally didn't turn best friends into chickens.

"What are you doing here?" Micky finally asked. The others were gathering around the door, too. Even Michael peeked out from around Davy's legs, looking up at the visiting genie, very obviously angry. He seemed to have puffed out his feathers to twice their normal volume, and the crest on his head was standing almost straight up.

((_How did you FIND us?_)) he demanded. Peter quickly translated.

"I followed you home last night," Forty-Two said. "You know, I felt bad when you brought up all that stuff about Mike being a musician. Uh… Can I come in?"

"As long as you promise not to grant any wishes we don't ask for," Micky said as the demon started to step inside. He held out a hand against Forty-Two's chest, pushing him back. "That means we gotta be looking at you, and say the words 'I wish,' and really mean it. Deal?"

Surprised, Forty-Two nodded. "I guess I owe that to you, at least. Okay, I promise."

"'ey," Davy snapped. "How d'we know he isn't just gonna go back on his word?" As soon as Micky pulled his hand away, Davy's shot out, resting against the genie's chest and holding him outside. "I can promise to sing the dictionary at our next gig. Doesn't mean I'm gonna follow through."

"Make it a rule!" Forty-Two said. "You can bind a demon. It's easy, I just have to agree to it. I need …" He looked around, eyes finally resting on a string of beads around Peter's neck. "That, can I have those?" He held out a hand, pointing, then beckoning for the item. Peter looked at Mike, who hesitated before nodding, and Peter pulled the beads off, handing them over.

As soon as they were in Forty-Two's hand, they began to glow softly with the same sparkly, foggy blue light that had announced his arrival the night before. "You gotta speak the words again," he said to Micky, holding the string suspended between both hands. As it glowed, an occasional sparkle would flitter to the floor and vanish.

"This isn't a wish or something, is it?" Davy asked. "'cuz I'm not cool with Micky wasting a wish on you. I'd rather shut the door in your face and then find you later when he thinks of something better."

Staring blankly, as if he'd been asked a stupid question, Forty-Two said, "No. It's a binding."

This time, Micky and Davy looked at Mike, who nodded. Micky couldn't help it. Despite their leader's condition, he was still in charge. It made sense to them, in a lot of ways, keeping things as close to normal as they could be, despite the circumstances. By this point, Mike had even calmed down, judging by the fact that he no longer looked like a round ball of black feathers; he was also standing in front of the others, between Davy and Forty-Two, as if he belonged there, protecting them all. Given the absurdity, Micky couldn't help a smile, and when he glanced over at Davy, his shorter friend held the same expression. Even worse was the fact that the sparkles that didn't reach the floor didn't immediately disappear, and a good number were coming to light on Michael's feathers.

"Okay." Micky took a deep breath, thinking about how to phrase it. "So the rule is that you have to be purposely asked if you're gonna grant a wish. No hearing us randomly say something and then taking it seriously, like 'I wish I had ice cream.' We gotta be talking to you and mean it."

Forty-Two grinned, straightened up to his full height, and said very formally, "I agree." The necklace stopped glowing, and he slipped it around his neck.

Davy dropped his hand, but the moment the demon took another step to enter, it was Peter who he found holding him back. "Hey, how do we know you aren't just gonna take that off and toss it aside when we're not looking?"

Forty-Two looked down at the beads, reaching for them, and holding them off his chest between two fingers. "It's a binding." When the others didn't seem to understand, he sighed and continued. "It doesn't matter where it is. I agreed to certain terms and I've bound myself to them. It's just something I can wear because it's in my best interest to keep it close to me. The only one who can release me from a binding is the person who did it in the first place, and that's him." He nodded to Micky. "If he doesn't release me, I'll be stuck granting honest wishes for the rest of my existence."

"Oh, and we wouldn't want _that,_" Davy said, crossing his arms.

"I'm a demon. Cut me some slack. It's in my job description to be devious and underhanded."

Peter finally dropped his hand. Forty-Two took another step, looking at the others to make sure no one else was going to stop him, before he managed to get out of the doorway. Micky shut the door behind him, and there they all stood, looking at each other.

Normally, Micky was the type of guy who'd invite someone in, ask them if he could get them something to drink, and tell them to make themselves comfortable. But with this guy, he felt understandably uneasy. After all, Forty-Two was a demon, and as he'd just said, it was his duty to cause trouble. Now here he was, having been welcomed into their home, and Micky had no idea what to do next. Neither did the others.

That's when Forty-Two held out a hand to him. "Look, I know your names already, but I think it's more of a mortal custom to introduce yourselves?" The genie smiled, and once again, Micky found himself studying the kid's character. He seemed awfully genuine for a supposedly evil being.

Returning the smile, Micky took Forty-Two's hand. "I'm Micky. That's Davy and Peter." He paused, indicating the others in turn. "…I guess you've already met Michael."

When the boy released Micky's hand, he paid a glance to Davy and Peter, before crouching down on the floor in front of Mike, whose feathers fluffed again. "All I could remember about you was that you had black hair and that green hat," Forty-Two muttered. "Why couldn't you just make a normal wish, huh? I wouldn't have…" He sighed, dropping to a sit, before running his hands through his hair. "Look, if I didn't do _something,_ I would have… I mean, there's consequences for breaking the rules, you get that, right?" He looked from Mike, to Micky, then Peter and Davy. To a man, they were all just staring, confused. Really, how would any of them know?

"It doesn't matter if you break the smallest rule or the biggest one. The punishment's always the same. And the same goes for breaking a binding, too, in case you're curious." He looked back at Michael, then, smiling a bit. "The good news is, I was thinking about how you made your wish, and I think we can undo this."

Michael's feathers flattened again, and he asked, ((_How?_))

Before Peter could translate, the demon replied. "You said, 'If you're a genie, I'm a Texas prairie chicken.' So the wish is tied to the idea that you can only be a Texas prairie chicken if I'm a genie. All we have to do is make me mortal."

Micky crouched down next to him, looking incredulous. "You'd do that? Give this up for Mike?"

Forty-Two rolled his eyes. "Look. I was created as a demon, but I have my own personality. If I could just leave all this behind, I would. Trust me. It's gonna take one of your wishes, though."

"Fine, I wish you weren't a genie!" Micky said without hesitation.

With a very long sigh, Forty-Two rubbed at his temples. Micky got the feeling that his wish hadn't worked, and a moment later, the demon said. "It's not _that_ easy. Come on. The Boss himself created me out of pure evil and the tears of a thousand innocent souls. You can't just wish that away… There are higher cosmic forces at work here."

((_So what do we do? Stop dancin' around it and just tell us!_))

"Okay, okay. The easiest way I can think of is to cause a ley line to rupture. Planets have energy too. I mean, without the existence of earth, it's possible that there wouldn't even be angels or demons at all. But I don't know, I'm not really privy to _those_ discussions. In any case, planetary energy can actually trump demonic energy. You stand in one of those as it ruptures, and you can make any wish you want, as long as it doesn't mess with the rules. All you have to do is wish that I was mortal."

"And that'll break this… what. Spell? Curse? On Mike?" Davy asked.

"No, it won't work," Peter said softly. He sat down next to Micky. "You said it yourself yesterday, Forty-Two. No one can make a wish that directly affects another person."

Forty-Two didn't seem fazed by this statement, even if the others slumped at the realization. Mike, who'd been building his hopes up since the idea started to come together, actually stumbled, only to be caught by his blonde bandmate and unceremoniously lifted into a hug.

"You guys, I'm not a person. I'm a _Being._ Think of me in the same category as an animal or a plant. If you wished to make a dog the size of an elephant, I could do that. Just like you can wish me mortal under the right circumstances." Forty-Two looked at Mike, adding, "It'd be a lot easier for me to fix this if Mike were classified as an animal, but he's not. I mean, at his core, he's a human being."

Mike struggled to get out of Peter's hug, but he eventually gave up. ((_So you're saying that this could work. We could really wish you mortal._))

"Yeah," the genie said. "There's no angelic binding on that. I don't think they figured I'd willingly tell someone else how to un-demonize myself, and it's too late to do it now. I'd never agree to it."

Micky really wouldn't have expected this either, honestly. Their only prior dealings with a demon happened with the wholly evil variety - the one that Forty-Two referred to as The Boss. "This is gonna sound like a weird question," he said. "But I gotta know. If there are good demons, are there… Are there bad angels?"

Forty-Two shrugged. "I don't know. The only one I ever met is the one that bound me, and she seemed pretty nice. We generally don't hang out with each other." Smiling, he rolled his eyes. "Old animosities and all that. I wouldn't be surprised, though. We're essentially created the same way, but I think… I think with them, there's probably less evil and crying involved. Pretty sure The Boss used to be an angel."

Davy sat down, too, completing the circle on the floor. "So I'm guessing this isn't going to be particularly easy."

"It's so difficult, I don't even know how we're going to pull it off yet," Forty-Two said with a grin. When Davy frowned, the demon reached out and clapped him on the shoulder. "But don't worry, my gentle British buddy. We'll make it work. The first thing we're going to need is a dead chicken."

Peter hugged Michael close. This time, Mike didn't protest.

Forty-Two's face paled. "No! No, no no, you don't … You don't understand. I just need you to go to the store and… acquire… a dead chicken. You know. At the supermarket.

Mike warbled a bit, still allowing Peter to hold onto him like a teddy bear. Forty-Two just bit his lip.

"What'd he say, Pete?" Davy asked.

"He said, 'honestly, I'm not too sure how I feel about that at this point.'"

"What's it even for?" Davy pressed. "C'mon, man, we're gonna give Mike a complex if we bring a dead chicken into the pad."

((_If I get out of this, I'm never eating chicken again,_)) Mike said, as Peter translated. ((_Way too weird._))

"Well," Forty-Two began. "I'm gonna walk you through a demon summoning ritual."

After a long silence, Micky said, "But you're already here."

"I don't know anything about ley lines, though."

"Iiii…" Peter dragged out the syllable, looking at the others. They all looked rather disturbed at the prospect of summoning a demon. "…don't know how comfortable we are with that."

"Oh, would you relax," Forty-Two said. "It's easy. All you have to do is get the chicken and help me out with a couple things. I'll do the rest of the work. It's not as if I can just poof back to hell any time I want to and bring back one of my buddies. Think of this as a sort of demonic telephone."

"Demonic telephone," Davy echoed.

"Yeah. Except there's fire and a little hot sauce involved."

"Hot sauce?!" Micky asked.

"Yeah, you got that in the fridge, right?"

In reply, Peter stood, heading over to the old refrigerator to open the door. The interior was mostly bare, save for a couple things that were decidedly not hot sauce.

"Oh," the demon said. "I guess I'll have to have you pick me up some of that, too."


	6. Chapter 6

To be fair, Peter was not a very good cook, which meant that Micky would be helping the demon in that department. He also had a bit of a daydreamer streak, so following Forty-Two's directions to the letter probably wasn't the best task for him. Davy's attention to the detail (usually in his own appearance, but still), earned him the title of Chief Demon Summoner, much to his own bafflement. After all, what did any of them really know about summoning demons?

That left one Peter Tork on his own to head to the store to acquire the ingredients required for the ritual. And when Mike realized that it left Peter _on his own,_ he insisted on coming along, especially because it was very uncommon to ever let Peter near the wheel of a car.

"I coulda done it," Peter said as they pulled into the parking lot of the nearest supermarket. "You know, I got the list with me."

((_Naw, you left the list on the table. I got it with_ me.)) Mike glanced at him wryly, holding up the crumpled piece of paper in one taloned foot. Embarrassed, Peter reached over and took it, flattening it out.

"Sorry, Mike. I woulda remembered, though. It's only a few things."

((_I know, Pete. I just didn't wanna be there, sittin' around, doin' nothin', though. And watchin' 'em read over Forty-Two's demon chicken recipe._)) He shivered, feathers fluffing. Peter giggled. ((_What?_))

"It's just… The feathers. Why do you do that?"

Mike shifted uncomfortably in the passenger's seat, shrugging his wings. ((_I dunno, it's kind of a reaction. Like blinkin', or sneezin', I dunno. All I know is, it's not always somethin' I think about._))

"But you _could_ do it on your own, if you wanted."

In reaction, Mike puffed up his feathers until he looked more like a dust bunny than a chicken. ((_That's not all. I discovered this last night, too._)) He stood up on the seat, taking a deep breath, and puffed out his throat like a balloon. Like a bright green, scaly balloon. When he let out the breath, he made a sound that was somewhere between a cluck and a boom - Peter couldn't tell.

When he took his hands off his ears, he asked, "What on earth would a prairie chicken need to do that for?"

He could almost hear the smile in Mike's voice when he replied, ((_Picking up chicks. What else?_))

"All right. Come on, Romeo," Peter chuckled, reaching out to lift up his friend. A moment later, he'd balanced Mike on his shoulder, and stepped out of the car. "You know, you should let me drive more. I'm pretty good at it."

((_I'm just really glad I can't see over the dashboard,_)) Mike grumbled.

They headed toward the store, dodging a couple people with shopping carts on the way. Mike got a couple odd looks, although Peter wasn't really paying attention. Instead, he was trying to figure out why Mike had come along if they were the ones out _buying_ the chicken. After all, back at home, they were just making the preparations for it. "You know we're here to buy the thing, right?" Peter asked.

Mike shifted on Peter's shoulder, head ducking down a little. ((_Well, yeah, I know, Pete._))

"I'm confused."

((_You're askin' me to be honest and all emotionally-involved here, and I ain't good at that._)) Peter glanced to the side, finding one fiery-colored eye staring back at him. ((_It's 'cuz I like someone around who I can talk to, all right? I dunno how you learned to talk to animals, but I'm awful grateful y'can._))

"You're not an animal, Mike. Forty-Two said so."

Peter grabbed a shopping cart, heading into the store, only to be immediately stopped by the greeter on the other side. "Hey! Hey, you can't have that bird in here! Service animals only!" The short, balding gentleman stormed up to them, shoulders hunched, and pointed toward the exit.

After leveling the man with a blank stare, Peter said the first thing that came to mind. "Him?" He pointed to Mike. "This is my. Uh. Seeing-eye parrot."

((_Good thinking, Peter,_)) Mike muttered.

The greeter looked at him with uncertainty, then back at the bird. "Doesn't look like any parrot I've ever seen. Besides, you look like you see just fine!"

"I'm very near-sighted," Peter explained. "Can't see a foot in front of my face."

"Yeah?" The man said. "How'd you get here?"

"Well, I drove. How else?" Peter paused, realizing his mistake. "Well, er… Fluffy here…"

((_I hate you a little._))

"Yeah, Fluffy is really good with … stuff like that. Directions. Right, left, 'stop, you're about to hit a tree…' you know, all that."

((_You should have just told him we took a cab!_))

"…And then I realized that driving while I was blind was pretty stupid, so we left our car by the side of the road and called a cab from the payphone at the gas station." Peter smiled under the greeter's scrutinizing glare, but little by little, the ugly expression softened.

"Go on. Next time you wanna shop here, you leave your weird parrot home. You understand?"

Sighing with relief, Peter smiled. "Yes, sir!"

Quickly, he pushed his cart around the man, who turned back to the door, shaking his head.

After the initial incident, the rest of the shopping trip went pretty smoothly. Both Micky and Davy had added a few things to the list, and Forty-Two tacked on a couple helpful items, as well. It wasn't a lot, since the Monkees weren't in possession of a lot of money, and what they did have generally went directly toward their rent. But, despite Michael's protests, they'd all decided that if it was for Michael, they'd spend a little extra on their groceries. It was with that in mind that Peter ventured into the Home and Garden aisle.

It always smelled weird in this area of the store, like a combination of old rubber hoses and fertilizer. It was unnaturally earthy, not like being outside at all, even though the signs and decorations hinted at the outdoors. Finally, he found what he was looking for.

((_We really don't need that,_)) Mike said.

Peter picked up the small bag of bird feed. "I know. I thought it'd be better for you than stale old bread, though. I was gonna surprise you with it, but you came along."

Mike said nothing, so Peter added it to the cart, and pushed it along.

((_I didn't mean to spoil the surprise. But really, Peter… Hopefully I won't be like this too much longer. What we got is fine. That's…_)) He squinted at the orange price tag. ((_That's a whole dollar we can put towards the rent. And you know, every little bit we spend all adds up._))

"Micky thought you'd say that, so he told me to tell you, 'Mike, let us take care of you for once.'"

Again, Mike was quiet for awhile, then, ((_Don't look appetizin' anyway. Micky was in on this, too?_))

"And Davy."

It was kind of sad that they had to argue about whether or not they could afford a bag of bird seed. Peter found himself thinking how easy it would be to just wish for a whole pile of money - that way, they wouldn't have to worry about when their next gig was, or where there next meal would be coming from. It wasn't as if they were completely in poverty, but their ability to afford little luxuries, like the bag of feed or the whole chicken they were about to buy, always came into question. When thinking about how they'd pay the utilities, running water always won out over full tummies.

The more it looked like they could fix this whole mess, the more Peter thought that maybe he should consider using his wish before they made Forty-Two mortal. Everything seemed to be working out now! He'd had the feeling it would, all the way down the line. And if everything did work out as planned, sooner or later, their personal genie would vanish forever.

But he couldn't just wish for anything. If something did go wrong, he had to be there for Mike. No one liked to be alone.

"Hey, Mike?"

((_Mm-hm?_))

"What d'you think I'd look like as a Texas prairie chicken?"

Mike rolled his eyes. ((_Don't go thinkin' about that just yet. That demon's gonna fix this mess._))

"I'm just saying."

((_Well._)) Mike craned his neck so he could take a good look at Peter. A lady strode by them at that point, looking over her shoulder as the blond seemingly conversed with a chicken sitting on his shoulder. Dressed in the store's red smock, she pushed a shopping cart, putting things away as she went. ((_You know how you can associate colors with things? Like, oh, I dunno. I kinda think of you as a bright yellow. Like sunshine or somethin'. So maybe you'd be all yellow._))

"I like yellow." Peter nodded. "I guess I'd be okay with that."

((_But don't worry about it, Peter. Let's just get to the meat counter and … get this over with. The sooner, the better._))

Taking a deep breath, Peter wheeled them toward the back of the store. The chill from the nearby freezers caused him to shiver, while Mike's feathers puffed up again against the cold. The man on the other side of the glass case wore a white smock and hat, and hummed a little tune as he restocked his inventory. As they approached, Mike looked toward the things for sale.

"You okay?" Peter muttered.

((_Feeling a little weird…_)) Mike replied.

"Well… Stop looking."

((_I don't think I can._))

The man behind the counter quirked a brow at this odd exchange, then went back to throwing freshly-cut steaks into the under-counter refrigerator. There wasn't a giant selection, but there was enough to make Mike a little shaky. "You know you aren't really a chicken," Peter said quietly.

((_Try tellin' that to my brain,_)) Mike said. ((_Just hurry up. Get what you need._))

Peter ordered one whole chicken, double-wrapped. Then, just in case, he asked if the butcher would wrap it one more time as he set it on the counter. Rolling his eyes, the man complied, gruffly commenting on the management allowing dirty animals inside the store. Peter gave him a good pout before taking the package and dropping it inside the cart.

With that being the last item on the list, Peter, sensing that Mike was nearly about to fall off his shoulder, hurried through the checkout.

Once they were back out in the parking lot, Mike seemed to be doing a little better, taking a few deep breaths as they headed toward the car. At Mike's insistence, Peter had parked the GTO as far away from all the other cars as possible; despite this, someone else had parked a black van right next to the driver's side door.

((_Figures,_)) Mike muttered. ((_People are like sheep. Go somewhere, and someone else is sure to follow you._))

Peter rolled his eyes. "You're doing that thing again, where you get all bitter and angry when you're upset."

((_Yeah, well…_))

Mike was cut off by a voice from behind them. "Hey! Hey, man, cool bird!"

Peter turned around so fast that Mike was barely able to hang onto his shoulder. Not too far away was a kid, probably about sixteen, wearing the store employee's red smock. It appeared that he'd been collecting the loose carts in the lot, but he abandoned the ones he'd already collected as he headed toward Peter. "What kind of parrot is that? Looks weird."

"Oh, him? He's a chicken, actually. Texas prairie chicken," Peter said. Outside the store, he felt no need to lie and say it was a parrot. He didn't much like lying anyway.

The kid reached for Michael, who shied away. But the kid persisted, and ultimately, was able to lay a hand on the perturbed musician-turned-chicken, and Peter couldn't help a little chuckle. Poor Mike looked so put-out, enough so that Peter said, "Careful, Fluffy bites."

Quickly, the boy pulled his hand away. "Er, sorry. Guess I should have asked first."

"It's okay. Here, lemme get my things out of the cart, and you can take this one, too. Save yourself a trip later."

Taking the bags, he handed the cart over, and the boy went on his way.

Squeezing around the black van, which was parked a little too close for comfort, Peter managed to get the driver's side door open as Michael said, ((_We really gotta talk about this whole 'Fluffy' thing._))

"What about it? It's cute," Peter replied, throwing the groceries into the back seat.

Peter supposed Mike would have answered, if he'd gotten the chance. At that moment, the side door of the van opened, and someone plucked Mike right off Peter's shoulder. For just a single moment, Peter thought this was all a little too cliche - that it had happened way too many times before in the movies to make this even remotely believable. If you wanted something done - a kidnapping, for example - you ought to really come up with a creative way of doing it.

Then again, cliches were cliches for a reason.

A moment later, Peter felt a sharp pain just behind his ear.

—-

When Peter awoke, he still seemed to be overwhelmed with the thought of his own kidnapping being horribly overdone. Though his mouth was dry, he still managed to find the words to admonish his captors, even though, at the moment, he was a little too sore to look up, and all he could see were their shoes. "People are gonna read this later, and they're going to be disappointed. You need to come up with new material."

"Read what?"

"You know. The… the story."

"He's still out of it, Boss."

Boss?

Fearing that he'd just told Forty-Two's boss - also known as Zero, also known as The Devil, also known as Satan - that his creativity could use some work, Peter finally looked up. He actually sighed with relief when he saw Babyface Morales and Tony Ferano standing over him.

"Yeah, he's out of it if he's glad to see us," Babyface grumbled.

It seemed they were in some sort of round metal tank - the kind that tended to hold large volumes of industrial liquids, like bleach or hydrochloric acid. Apparently it hadn't been used in some time, though, because the walls and floor were dotted with rust, and on one side, a drain cover hung partway removed from its hinge, its seal broken. It was dark, save for a row of fluorescent lights far above them, which fizzled and popped and hummed with their old age. Against one side of the tank, a ladder led upward to a platform, where five or six more men with guns were standing ready.

Peter also noted that Mike was tucked under Tony's arm.

"Leave 'em here," Babyface said. "We got a letter to write. There ain't no way they're gettin' out."

"Babyface, this one here's got wings. He'll escape."

Babyface looked at Mike, who cowered back, trying to hide in the folds of Tony's expensive suit. Peter didn't particularly like the expression with which the gangster was fixing his friend.

"Deal with it."

Mike struggled, but Tony still managed to get a hold around him, and with the other hand, he pulled sharply on one wing until a wet pop echoed through the holding tank. Mike made a meaningless sound, horrible, high-pitched, angry, and pained, before Tony casually tossed him to the floor as if he were a stuffed toy.

"You stay there," he said, pointing to Peter, "or I'll do the same thing to you."

He and Babyface both turned, ascending the ladder. When they reached the top, one of the other burly thugs pulled out the only means of escape, setting it to the side, before they all vanished from view.

"God, Mike, are you— "

((_No! No, I'm not okay!_)) He fluttered weakly on the floor, continuing to make untranslatable clucks and twitters; his injured wing was held out loosely to one side as he staggered aimlessly. ((_Fix it! Fix it, fix it, fix it!_))

Sitting up, Peter rubbed the back of his neck, trying to massage the headache away, but it stubbornly persisted. "I don't know if I can," he said truthfully.

((_Gimme a… Gimme a sec, lemme just…_)) He took a couple deep breaths, eyes closing. The avian face lacked the ability to form most expressions, but it still managed to appear hurt.

Peter reached for him, gently lifting Mike into his lap, and very carefully running a hand down the injured wing. Mike tensed, managing to remain silent despite the pain he must have been feeling, but it wasn't until Peter's hand reached the shoulder joint that he cried again. Maybe this would be a little easier to deal with than a break; Peter could feel both the limb and the socket, if he could just—

With another pop, he managed to re-fit the dislocation.

Peter decided that he never, ever wanted to hear a chicken scream, like Mike did at that point, ever again.


	7. Chapter 7

A powder blue fire burned on the kitchen floor.

Davy had no idea how the demon made it blue, or why it didn't give off any smoke or even really smell like a fire, but there it burned, in a perfect circle, with an inner ring of salt drawn in the center. They'd used up the rest of their salt to do that, but Forty-Two said it'd be worth it. Micky, with what little he knew about the supernatural, said he seemed to recall salt being used to ward off evil spirits.

Forty-Two just laughed and rolled his eyes. "The things they tell mortals," he chuckled.

Apparently, the way the genie intended to prepare the chicken in the middle of this fire would imitate the scent of a lost soul, thus attracting a fellow demon. The fire, called demonfire, would serve to ensure that a hellcreature would appear, and the salt attracted a specific type - one who could find and rupture a leyline. The demon would take the bait, devour the chicken, and be indebted to perform one task for Fourty-Two for the offering. That was the plan, anyway.

The fire actually was kind of pretty, and occasionally gave off a tiny sparkle, which would float upward and eventually burn itself out. It actually looked a lot like the aura that the genie himself seemed to possess. Forty-Two explained that this was because every demon had a certain sort of color association, something personal to them, that existed as a sort of imprint of their presence. His just happened to be a soft, angelic cerulean that most people found not at all intimidating.

Despite the fact that it didn't entirely behave like a fire, it sure was hot. Micky had, at one point, scalded the hair right off his arm when he'd gotten too close, and Davy's sleeve was blackened at one corner.

"The longer it burns, the hotter it gets," Forty-Two said. "So you may want to stay back." Smiling tolerantly at his two mortal companions, he leaned over the fire to adjust the salt circle in the center, and the beads around his neck rested directly in the leaping flame.

Davy quickly reached out to pull the boy away, and they both tumbled backward onto the floor.

Forty-Two's confused eyes met his. "What'd you do that for?"

"The thing— The bind." Davy pointed at the necklace. "You were tryin' to destroy it or somethin', sitting it right in the fire!" He wouldn't have put it beyond the demon to do so. They were supposed to be tricky, guileful critters with a distinct drive for getting their own way at any cost. Oddly, though, the necklace didn't even seem singed. In fact, it looked just as normal as ever.

"Oh, this," Forty-Two said. He slipped it off over his neck, and handed it to Davy. Peter made it out of cotton thread and regular old glass beads, but while the beads could probably withstand the heat, the thread should have burned. As Davy moved the beads around, though, he found that the string wasn't even a little blackened. Forty-Two said, "It's a bind. It can't be destroyed. You guys can do anything to it, but it'll never break. I'm serious. The only being who can destroy a bind - besides the person who made it - is a demon who's much higher in rank than I am. I'm talking _maybe_ the Boss." He held out his hand, and Davy returned the beads.

"You don't trust me, do you, Davy?" Forty-Two asked.

Davy looked past Forty-Two to Micky, who'd seated himself up on the counter. With no cooking to do until the other guys returned, they were just killing time, watching the genie work. "Ah, I guess I made it pretty obvious. But can y'blame me?" Neither overly trustful nor distrustful, the Englishman couldn't really discern any reason why he _should_ give his trust over to a creature from hell.

Until he saw the look on Forty-Two's face. Davy would describe it as stoically resigned, without necessarily being offended. The demon's lower lip stuck out just a little as he bit the top one, then he quickly turned away and slipped the beads back over his head. "So, uh. So you guys play music?" he asked.

Micky hopped down from the counter, careful to keep his distance from the fire, and sat down next to Davy. "Yeah, the four of us? We're the Monkees. Not… Very well known. Yet!" He held up one finger to punctuate his point. "We got some pretty awesome songs, though, so we get a gig now and then. … More _then_ than _now,_ to be honest. How long's it been, Davy?"

"At least three weeks. Maybe three and a half."

Pulling his knees up, Forty-Two rested his arms across them. "Seems like you guys could really use a wish right about now." Smiling, looking at the demonfire, he asked, "What would you guys wish for, if you could? And I promise, no granting anything unless you actually ask for it."

Micky eyed the beads around the boy's neck, opting to trust their devilish friend's word. "Oh, maybe that we'd get more gigs. I guess that wouldn't work, though. Can't affect the will of someone else, right? So you couldn't make more people hire us."

"Well," Forty-Two shrugged. "Luck is actually a pretty powerful force. You wish for more luck landing a job, and the universe tips in your favor. Still, I dunno why you wouldn't just ask for a pile of money. You'd all be set for life."

"What good is money if you're not doing something you enjoy?" Davy spoke, abruptly cutting off anything else the genie would have said. "I mean, yeah, it's … it's great. You don't have to wonder if you're going to eat, or if the food you end up with is going to be Peter's infamous mayonnaise pie. But, you know, we have something here."

"C'mon, Davy. You wouldn't wish to at least keep the rent paid?" Micky asked.

"Well, maybe that.

Forty-Two chuckled.

"What, you don't believe us?" Davy snapped, thick brows lowering over dark eyes.

"No, that's just the thing. I do," the demon returned. "Before I was a genie, I was a daemonling. Did it for … oh, I don't know. A few centuries. That's kind of the lowest rung of hell's ladder, where you spend your days torturing souls, you know? I didn't like it much, 'cuz they were all so selfish. 'Why me, what did I do wrong, it's not my fault.' The others told me that all humans were like that - they'd grab what they could and run. That's why they were so fun to play with. It's why The Boss wants them so badly. They entertain him."

"Beautiful sentiment," Micky muttered.

"Yeah, well. I believed it. I thought this thing would be easy. Offer humans a wish, and they'd just say the first thing that came to mind, like… 'Oh, I want gold!' And they go home and their wife is nothin' more than a gold statue."

Davy and Micky stared at him. The latter actually scooted back a few inches, before Forty-Two waved his hands. "The thing is, the first time I pulled something like that, you guys were so concerned about your friend that it made me realize that you can't all be that selfish. You don't just grab at the first thing you can get. You're not asking for the easy road to wealth."

Perhaps Davy expected him to elaborate, but he didn't. Instead, the genie went back to playing with the fire, his fingers moving through the flames without burning.

"Forty-Two, what would you wish for?" Micky asked.

"Me?"

"Yeah. If you could, I mean."

He rolled his eyes in thought, looking at the ceiling for awhile. Surely it would have been easy for a demon to come up with something he wanted! Weren't their needs all the same? Souls to torture, unwilling victims to devour, society to lead astray?

"Shorter horns," the genie finally said. And then he laughed quite heartily as Davy and Micky stared at him as if he _had_ grown horns. "What? You don't think this is what I really look like, do you? I'm a demon. Demons are ugly. And my horns are like…" He held an arm above his head, fingers reaching, wiggling as he tried to get just a little more height. After a little while of this, he gave up and said, "Well, they're really tall. They'd tear up your ceiling.

He continued holding a hand above his head, until he noticed that the other two were still staring at him. Slowly, he lowered his arm back into his lap, turned his eyes back to the fire, and pouted.

Micky chuckled, sliding around Davy so he could put a hand on Forty-Two's shoulder. "You don't just _look_ like a kid. You _are_ a kid, aren't you? I mean, you're pretty young by demon standards."

"…Well, I'm not… I'm not a baby."

"How old are you? I mean, if we were to translate demon years to human years?" Davy asked.

Pouting in earnest now, Forty-Two hunched his shoulders, narrowing his eyes at Davy, and hugged his knees. "Old enough!"

There was an ever-so-slight edge to the boy's voice, like the echo of nails on a chalkboard, or wind through broken reeds. When he shouted, the fire danced higher, its blue flame illuminating the ceiling and causing a slight blackening of the drywall. The demon's eyes widened, and he reached his hands into it, tugging at it, pulling it toward himself as if he were consuming it.

Micky and Davy reached for each other at the same time, both attempting to pull the other away to safety, with the result of both of them falling onto their sides. They covered their heads, though Davy peeked out through a narrow opening between his arms to watch Forty-Two corral the fire, until it became nothing at all.

Breathing heavily, the demon clutched at his chest, lips curled, nose wrinkled, a look of severe concentration etched on his face. He looked older then, less like the innocent boy they'd been teasing, and more like a very wise, very old man trapped in the body of a pre-teen. When he opened his eyes again, they were a bright, glowing orange.

"Are you two okay?"

Weakly, Davy nodded. "What was that?"

"Part of me," came the cryptic explanation. "What you'd call a soul or a spirit. An extension of myself. I lost focus." Grimacing, Forty-Two pulled his hands off his chest and checked them, as if he were looking for signs of bleeding. Laughing humorlessly, he said, "If we'd lit your house on fire with that, we would have summoned every demon along the entire Pacific coast."

"…You had that little bonfire going in our _kitchen,_" Micky observed. He glanced around at the pad, possibly imagining the entire place being engulfed with fire. "Your buddies like fire that much?"

"No, no, it's …" Forty-Two trailed off, shaking his head, before continuing with an entirely different thought. "It's… Gonna take a while for me to get this going how I had it again. What time are Peter and Mike due back?"

Davy checked his watched, frowning. "Well, Peter said they'd be a couple hours, but that was up an hour ago.

The boy breathed deeply, attempting to gather the salt back into a circle on the floor, but Micky reached out for his wrist, stopping him. "Look, something about that fire had you worried. I want to know what it was."

"Let's just say, it's pretty potent."

"Nah, c'mon, man," Micky said, his smile turning slightly less than friendly.

Davy interrupted him, though, swatting at his shoulder. "Guys, they're late getting back. What if something happened?"

Losing interest in the Forty-Two for the time being, Micky asked, "What, at the super market? How much trouble could he— "

But the words faded away into a couple last, disorganized syllables, before they both said, "They're in trouble."

The response was almost automatic. Davy stood, running for the door, with Micky not too far behind. It wasn't until he'd made it around the front of the house and outside that he realized the flaw in this plan. Standing in the driveway, looking into the street, Davy realized that Peter and Mike had the GTO, somewhere across town at the supermarket.

"Are you thinking what I'm thinking?" Micky asked, catching up.

"Yeah," Davy grumped. Walking would be out of the question, because it would take them a couple hours to get to the store. Neither of them knew the local bus routes, either. "Our only option is to call for a taxi."

Forty-Two sauntered after them. His eyes were slowly losing their odd sunset-orange color, returning to their previous blue. "You don't really think something's wrong, do you? Maybe they got distracted. Shiny objects and all that. Peter seems like the type."

"Hey, Peter may be easily distracted, but he knows when to focus," Micky said, running his hands through his hair. "The problem is… Trouble seems to follow him… Or he seems to follow trouble. One of the two. If he was gonna be late, he woulda called, I'm sure.

"You guys really know each other, don't you?" the demon asked, his tone bordering on awed.

"Well… Yeah," Davy said, as if this should be common knowledge. "Okay, I'm gonna call a taxi. Micky, see if you can get together some cab fare."

"Nah, wait a sec, Davy."

The shorter man had already turned to head back to the house, and nearly fell over as he turned back around. "No? But— "

"I got a wish, don't I?" Micky asked, looking at Forty-Two. Surprised, the demon nodded. "Well, look, I'll wish for a car… We can get going sooner rather than later, you know? And… And then later on, we can sell it so we can pay our rent."

"But, Micky…" Davy started.

But the drummer was pressing on. "We only need one wish, right? We need someone to wish Forty-Two here mortal, and Peter's got his wish on standby for something like that. What else do we need? I can think of a hundred things I want, but … waiting for a cab to get over here isn't one of 'em. And fishing around for change in the chair cushions is gonna take a long time."

"And probably only get us a couple blocks," Davy said, looking at the ground.

It seemed like an awful use of a wish, but it made sense, all things told. It would also double as a brief source of income, if Micky followed through on selling it, which Davy couldn't guarantee in his own mind. Micky and Mike both loved cars.

Taking Davy's silence as agreement, Micky turned to Forty-Two. "All right, here's my wish. I need a car, but let's make this specific, 'cuz I've read lots of books about demons being really tricky. It's gotta run, and it's gotta be legal. Plates and tags and, you know, all the stuff that normally comes with a car. Oh, and don't try to leave the key out, I'll need that to— "

Forty-Two held up a hand, smiling. "I got it."

"You sure? 'cuz… 'cuz demon or not, if you mess this up, I'm going to find a way to tie you to a chair and make you listen to the worst record I can find on loop for like, seventeen hours.

"Why seventeen?" Davy wondered.

"Eighteen then."

"Better."

"Turn around, tell me what you think," Forty-Two said.

Davy and Micky turned.

It was a Mustang - brand new by the look of it. Quite ordinary, compared to their own GTO, but it sure was pretty. It was sort of an army green color, with a black interior and chrome accents here and there on the front and back. Davy approached it, looking in through the window, to find the proper paperwork on the seat, along with the keys. "This is a 1969 model," he said.

"You didn't specify old or new. I figured you'd want new."

Micky nodded, trailing his hand along the handle.

"It's totally legal. I don't technically have to fool with anyone's mind. All I had to do was put a couple new files together under your name." The demon shrugged. "There might be a few mistakes, but nothing they'd catch. You know."

"Oh, man, this is amazing," Micky said, crooning over the car. He walked along side it, catching his reflection in the paint, until he nearly ran into Davy, who was standing on his toes.

"Mickyyy," he said, drawing out the last syllable. "Focus. We've gotta go find Mike and Peter."

"Right," the curly-haired man said. "Okay, everyone in. Let's take this baby for a test drive."


	8. Chapter 8

Mugsy had no gift with language. His writing bordered on sub-par. Sometimes, even his thoughts got jumbled up in his head, split into unrecoverable bits and pieces like a jigsaw puzzle of clear blue sky. He could hold a gun, though, and shoot it. Certainly he had talent at roughing people up, along with his high-demand prowess at looking positively intimidating. He wouldn't call himself a scholar, but Mugsy was not stupid by any stretch of the word. So, despite his shortcomings, he didn't question Babyface when he was told to write the ransom note.

"Nes— Nez— " Hm. For some reason, he couldn't recall the chicken's last name. It definitely started with an N, though, and then probably an E. Scribbling something unintelligible and unpronounceable after the first couple letters, he went on to write the other boy's name, as well. Tork was easy enough to remember.

Bring the genie, blah, blah, blah. Mugsy wasn't a fan of all this crazy magic stuff going on around him, because it wasn't something he could hold in his hand. Because it didn't exist tangibly, it couldn't really exist at all. Babyface seemed far too rational himself to believe in things like demons and djinn, so why couldn't he just go back to robbing jewelry stores like a normal criminal?

A muffled, faraway voice came from their hostages' prison. At first, Mugsy paid no attention to it, but then it repeated, the words becoming clearer: "It's cold down here. Hey! Is anyone there?"

With no heart to speak of - that Mugsy knew about, anyway - he grabbed a couple dropcloths off the old industrial equipment and marched through the old factory. Stomping his feet up the flight of stairs that led to the catwalks around the tanks, he found the one in which their captives were imprisoned. "Hey!" he called, throwing the handful of sheets down. "Shut up! I'm tryin' to think out here!"

Cowed, Peter muttered a quiet "Sorry," and pulled the cloths away from the wall, closer to the chicken who sat in a dazed manner nearby.

Poor kid, Mugsy caught himself thinking. "Well, you better be," he said, marching back down the stairs.

—-

Micky may have been in love. The car was amazing - everything he ever dreamed it could be. Fast, too - or, at least, she would have been fast if Micky felt comfortable opening her up a little, but that engine had to be broken in first. Carefully. _Lovingly._ The whole thing almost made him forget about Mike and Peter being missing, and he started to wonder just how much trouble they could get in at a supermarket.

"Focus, Micky."

"You talkin' to yourself, Mate?" Davy asked.

"Yeah," Micky said. "If I don't, I'm afraid I'm gonna keep driving around 'til we run out of gas, and neither of us have a wish left."

Forty-Two leaned forward from the back seat. "You can't wish away stupid, anyway."

"Hey! You really should be wearin' a seatbelt!" Davy said, turning, narrowing his eyes so much that his eyebrows almost covered them completely.

"Look, if you wreck this car, I'll go flying. But I'll just get up and dust myself off." The genie shrugged. "That said, I'd prefer it if you didn't. It's probably still uncomfortable to crash through a windshield.

"I've got noooo intention of crashing Matilda here." Micky smiled brightly, glancing sideways for just a moment to give them both his most charming grin.

"You can't name a car 'Matilda,'" Davy said. "How about, like, Roxanne, or Julia?"

Micky patted the dashboard, still grinning. "Nah, she's a Matilda, she told me."

Davy grunted, throwing his hands up in defeat. Maybe they'd get used to the name. Looking out the corner of his eye at Forty-Two, he said, "And you, sit back and get your seatbelt on. You still look like a kid, and, well, you know."

"Yeah, I'm with Davy on this one. Just humor us and do it," Micky added. Rear seatbelts were a pretty new thing, and since this car happened to have them, Micky felt they ought to be used. He certainly wasn't comfortable with the fact that the kid wasn't at least behind a chair, which would stop him from flying out the front window if they did happen to hit something.

Chuckling, Forty-Two did as asked. "If I didn't know any better, I'd think you two actually cared about what happened to me."

It wasn't long before Micky pulled into the supermarket lot. The GTO, being parked so far away from the store - probably at Mike's insistence - was fairly easy to find, and Micky pulled up next to it. The first sign that something may have been wrong was that, while the driver's side door appeared closed, it was just partially ajar.

Concerned, Davy was first to jump out of the Mustang, immediately looking through the other car's window. "Hey…" Using his hands to shield his eyes from the light, he pressed his face closer to the glass, looking into the back seat. "The bags are in the car, look. They were already done shoppin'."

Micky shouldered Davy out of the way, taking a look, as well. "That's kinda weird. Wonder if they went back in for something." Navigating around the car, he opened the passenger door and pushed the seat out of the way, crawling into the back. Rummaging through the bags, he mentally recreated the checklist they'd sent with Peter, finding everything accounted for. Including the chicken, which was no longer very cold. "Hnh… They didn't forget anything, and this stuff has been here awhile," he said, loud enough so that Davy heard him through the window.

"Let's check inside," Davy suggested. "Maybe someone saw where they went."

Micky backed out of the car and shut the door, leaning on the top. "This is Peter we're talking about. You don't think he accidentally left Mike with the butcher…"

One horrified look later, the three boys were running for the store's entrance, bounding through the shoppers, and then inside. It was getting late in the afternoon, so there were quite a few people around, and a lot of shopping carts and aisles to navigate. Finally, they came upon the white-aproned man behind the meat counter.

"Hey, mister!" Micky called, leaning over the glass. "Hey, have you seen a guy, about my height— "

"Oh, a little shorter," Davy said.

"Yeah, a little shorter, but not as short as him," Micky went on, pointing to Davy, who huffed and crossed his arms, "with blond hair and blue eyes, carrying around a chicken?"

The guy behind the counter seemed more interested in the ham he was slicing up than in the question. Still, after a moment, he said, "Yeah, had the thing sitting on his shoulder. Kept talking to it. Weird. Then he'd shut up for awhile and wait, like the stupid bird was talkin' back."

"Mike's not stupid," Davy said defensively.

"Who names a bird 'Mike?'" the butcher replied.

The question was rhetorical, but Micky felt the need to answer, anyway. "Well, it's a good, strong name, you know? And when you have a chicken as a pet, you need something that says… uh…"

"That this chicken is no wimp," Forty-Two said.

"Right, so you call it something great, like Killer, or Rabies, or…"

"You can't name a bird 'Rabies,' either," the butcher said. "Birds can't even _get_ rabies."

"Well, that's why we named him Mike, see?"

The butcher nodded, although it didn't really appear that he _saw_ at all. However, he did seem quite busy, so he probably wanted the three kids out of his hair. Well, what little hair he had, anyway. "Look," Micky went on, eying the chicken cutlets on display. "The blond guy didn't try to give you the chicken, did he? Like, in exchange for another one, of the more living-impaired variety?"

"Naw," the butcher said. "Just had me triple wrap the one he bought, then he made a beeline for the checkout. Don't think the one on his shoulder woulda sold anyway. Too scrawny."

"Yeah, that… sounds like Mike," Davy said, running his fingers through his hair. "Well, that's one less thing to worry about, anyway. He's no one's dinner."

"Someone at the checkouts may have seen him," Forty-Two suggested.

"Yeah, but who stays in a store _after_ they buy stuff?" Micky questioned. "It's not like the cashiers could tell us where they live."

Davy rolled his eyes, shaking his head. A moment later, the lightbulb lit up above Micky's head.

"Oh. Oh, the cashiers! Riiight. Yeah, let's go try them."

They asked a few of the cashiers, but it seemed that there had been a shift change between the time Mike and Peter had made their purchase and the time Micky and Davy had arrived. None of the people on duty had seen a long-haired boy carrying around a black chicken on his shoulder. After moving on to the stockboys and coming up without any additional answers, it seemed that they weren't going to get any farther with their search, until one lady doing inventory in the Home and Garden section mentioned that she and one of the employees who retrieved carts in the parking lot were part of a different shift. She'd seen the kid with the chicken, so maybe he had, too?

"Seems kind of weird for your entire job to circle around retrieving shopping carts, doesn't it? I mean, I could do that," Micky said, as they passed the checkout counters and went back outside.

"You might have to," Davy said, almost darkly, under his breath. "I mean, if this all doesn't work and we actually have to get a part-time job, like Mike said."

"What do you mean, get a job?" Forty-Two asked. "I thought you guys were musicians."

Micky leaned against the store's brick wall, propping one foot up on it, and shoving his hands into his pockets. "Well, what we do isn't exactly what you'd call… steady work. And we're a quartet, you know? The four of us, we play together, or we don't play. We were talking about just getting a few gigs on the side while he's… incapacitated…"

"There's one," Davy said. "But Micky wouldn'ta been able to do it. No room for drums and all."

"Plus, Mike kinda holds us together," Micky continued. "I dunno how that happened. I think we all kinda gravitated together and he thought, 'hey, I better figure out how to keep these guys focused.' And so he just ended up bein' 'Fearless Leader.' It's just what he does."

"But we gotta pay the rent somehow. And if we're not gonna play, we're gonna have to figure something else out," Davy said. "I mean, I never even thought of it, and there's Mike, the day after he got all feathery, lookin' out for us instead of feelin' sorry for himself." He paused, sighing. "Look, guys, I'm gonna go in there and grab a couple applications. See if you can find out anything."

Davy turned away, heading back into the store.

"He does everything for us," Micky said. "We gotta find that chicken."

"Chicken?"

A boy pushing carts up to the store looked at him, smiling. "A few hours ago, there was this guy who had a chicken sitting up on his shoulder."

"Was he going into the store, or leaving?" Micky asked.

"He was on his way out. It was a real cool-looking bird. I thought it was a parrot at first. I tried to pet it, but its owner said that he'd bite."

"Did you see what happened? Like, where they might have gone?"

The kid shrugged, pointing in the direction of where the GTO still sat in the parking lot. "They went that way. There was a black van there, I thought it was theirs, seeing as they got into it and drove off." He paused, scratching his chin. "You know, come to think of it, that's kind of weird. I mean, who takes their company van out to go grocery shopping? With a chicken?"

Micky felt himself getting cold, and his stomach was doing flip-flops. Peter, of course, had no black van, and given the condition of their car when Micky and Davy found it, Peter left in a hurry. Mike wouldn't have let them willingly get into some strange vehicle, either, which meant this was sounding more and more like a kidnapping. "You said it was a company van…" Micky prompted.

"Yeah, I thought that's what it must have been," the boy replied. "There were big white letters on the side that said 'Friendly's Industrial Cleaning.' Sorry, there was a phone number, too, but I don't remember…"

The information was enough to make Micky smile. "That's perfect, that's enough for now. We gotta go find Davy."

Leaving the baffled cart collector behind them, Micky ran back into the store, looking left and right for Davy, only to find him chatting up one of the women at the checkout counters. Growling and shaking his head, Micky stomped over, grabbing Davy by the shoulder. "I thought you were getting an application!"

"Yeah, but Melanie here said they were all out," Davy said.

"So you decided to conduct an interview on the spot? Helpful," Micky muttered. "C'mon, we need to find a phone book. I got an address I want to look up."

"Oh, here, you can use ours," Melanie said, reaching under the counter for it. "We're not supposed to lend it out, but Davy's so cute… You won't take it, will you?"

Micky grabbed it out of the lady's hands. "Just borrowing it for a sec." He flipped through it until he located the proper section, and then, thumbing down the list, he found an address. Setting the book back on the counter, he muttered a thanks, then pulled Davy away. Melanie blew him a kiss on the way out.

"Well, for once, your skirt-chasing paid off," Micky said, leading them toward the car.

"She wasn't wearin' a skirt. It was a dress," Davy corrected. "What'd you learn?"

"It looks like Peter and Mike were taken by some guys from 'Friendly's Industrial Cleaning," Micky said. "Don't know what they'd want with a bass player and a chicken, but we're gonna find out."

—-

((_…Can't judge an apple by lookin' at the… Tree._))

Seeing no other way to tear the cloth, Peter did his best to chew a hole through it so he could get his fingers in far enough to rip it into a strip. It tasted awful. Dusty. Like years of humidity and mildew had taken their frustrations out on it with a vengeance.

((_Can't … judge…_))

Finally, he made a little progress, but the thing was pretty thick and hard to tear. The taste stuck in his mouth, but he worked the hole a little more with his teeth, anyway.

((_Can't judge one by lookin' at the other…_))

"That's not the right order, Mike," Peter said.

((_Can't judge a book by lookin' at the cover._))

The cloth finally gave up the fight and lost out to Peter's strength. He tore it as long as he thought he needed it, then realized he'd have to rip it horizontally, as well, against the grain.

((_Oh, can't you see…_))

"Would you cut it out? That thug's gonna come back."

((_Nah, I think I'm gonna finish._))

Although he was in pain, Mike's thoughts seemed to be pretty clear. Peter couldn't be sure why he was singing, although it might have given him something to focus on other than the previously dislocated shoulder. He couldn't quite get the wing to fold up against his side, so it hung to the ground, the flight feathers curved inward and ragged.

((_You misjudged me._))

Stupid sheet. Stupid sheet. Tear already!

((_I look like a farm animal…_))

"Now I _know_ that's not now it goes."

((_Appropriate, though._)

"Carry on."

((_But I'm a lover! You can't judge a book by lookin' at the cover._))

Peter sang the last line with Mike, and chuckled, finally getting the sheet to tear how he wanted it. With the narrow, thin strip in his hand, he walked on his knees over to his chicken friend. "All right, I'm gonna tie your wing to your side so the injury doesn't get worse. Okay?"

((_This is gonna hurt, isn't it?_))

"Probably."

Mike sighed, then started singing again. The actual sound that anyone else would have heard was low, musical, almost comforting; while Peter couldn't simply shut off his understanding of the strange fowl language, he concentrated more on the otherworldly beauty of the song itself, as he reached again for the wing and pulled it to Mike's side. For just a moment, an out of place note sounded among the careful arrangement.

((_Can't judge a fish by lookin' in the pond._))

Peter very slowly wrapped the cloth around the injured wing a few times, careful not to pull at it more than he had to. Every once in awhile, the song jumped flat or sharp or lost its tune entirely, but always recovered.

((_…Can't judge… Somethin'…_))

After looping the bandage around Mike's limb, Peter took the tail end of it and wrapped it around the feathery body a couple times, pulling it as tight as he could while still allowing Mike to breathe.

"That okay?"

Mike's only response was to continue singing.


	9. Chapter 9

Micky did not like the look of this place. Deep in the industrial sector of the city, Friendly's Industrial Cleaning ended up being an abandoned complex, emptied of its entire business some months prior. Of course, he couldn't be sure of how long it'd been vacant - sometime between the publishing of the supermarket phone book and now - but it certainly had enough of a creepy aura about it for him to take a good guess.

Without maintenance, grass and weeds grew up through cracks in the pavement, and the power situation remained sketchy at best. As the car slowly moved through the complex's gigantic parking lot, they passed under several streetlights that didn't work at all anymore, and a few that flickered on and off ominously. Utility poles were bent at odd angles, likely to fall over with just the slightest push, taking the whole electrical grid down with them. Given the fact that the sun was now below the horizon and it would soon be dark, Micky was very careful not cause a complete blackout.

Looming ahead of them was an enormous box-shaped building, paneled in steel grey. Green letters on the front face of the structure told them they'd located the right place, although a few of the letters had fallen off and lay useless on the ground. Near the top of the building, curling nearly all the way around it, was a row of windows, many of which were broken out or cracked.

And parked just in front of the building was the black van that the kid back at the supermarket told them about.

Micky killed Matilda's headlights a good distance away, even though he could probably still be seen in the waning daylight. Stopping the Mustang far from the building itself, he pointed toward the windows. "The lights are on in there, see? I think we mighta found the right place."

Davy rolled the window down, hanging out of the car and squinting at the building. "I don't see anyone outside," he said. "No guards or… Anything. You'd think if someone was doin' a kidnapping, they'd want someone else lookin' out for 'em."

"What would a cleaning company want with a bass player and a chicken, anyway?" Micky wondered.

"It's gotta be more than that," Forty-Two said. "I can feel it. Something about this area and the people in it. There's this wave of…" He took a deep breath, inhaling through his nose. His eyes widened, and he pushed Davy's chair forward, nearly squashing the short Englishman, so he could lean out the window and sniff at the air.

"'Ey! Watch what you're doin'!" Davy grunted, pressing back on his chair.

"Evil intent. I can smell it."

"Wha— You can _smell evil?_" Davy asked, finally succeeding in righting the back of his chair. "You must be joking. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard!" After a pause, he amended: "Well, today, anyway."

Still straining for the window, Forty-Two smiled. "It's like a Siren's song."

"Great," Micky muttered, opening his door and stepping outside. "We're tryin' to save Michael and Peter, and there's some kind of demonic apple-pie-chocolate-cake buffet in there. Forty-Two, we're gonna need you to — " He trailed off, catching the perfect way the sunset caused the paint on Matilda to sparkle.

"Were you gonna say 'focus,' Micky?" Davy asked.

"Right. Focus."

"There's more," Forty-Two said. "I can smell Michael and Peter in there. But I can also detect someone who's been affected by a genie's magic before. It's really kinda…"

He started pushing forward on Davy's seat again. Muttering something that sounded like 'bloody demon,' Davy opened the door and hurried to get out of Forty-Two's way. Once he was able, the demon exited the car, as well. "It's really familiar. Huh."

"Look, we'll think about this once we figure out how we're gonna get in there and rescue those guys," Micky said. "I think if we just get closer a little bit at a time, we can hide behind stuff until we're at the front doors. That way, in case anyone _is_ watching, they won't see us as we sneak in."

Davy looked toward the towering steel-grey box of a building, then back at Micky, crossing his arms. "There's nothing to hide behind between here and the entrance. Except the van."

"That may be a problem."

"Well, look, we don't see anyone out here, right? And we're in the open." Davy gestured toward the factory again, narrowing his eyes. "They woulda seen us already if they were gonna see us, I think. Maybe opened fire a few minutes ago?"

Micky nodded, rubbing his chin. It was a good point. Still, if there were people watching, maybe they were just biding their time, like in the movies. Wait for the good guys to get close, then spring the trap. "Hey, Davy, we're the good guys, right?"

Davy shrugged. "I'd like to think so."

Forty-Two was still sniffing around the car, concentration evident on his face.

"Well," Micky said. "if we're the good guys, we win, right? That's how this story's gotta end."

Again, Davy shrugged. "I don't know. I haven't read the rest of it. I've just been kind of improvising. I'd assume so. This isn't a Lovecraft tale."

"So no matter how we go about this, we— Hey! HEY! What are you doing!"

Forty-Two was smelling his shoulder, one hand wrapped around the drummer's curls, and the other holding fast to his shirt. "Ah-ha! The guy in there! He smells like you, Micky! Exactly like you. Do you have a twin?"

"Lemme go! Get outta here!" Micky pushed the demon away, but a moment later, the words sunk in. He and Davy looked at each other, their eyes meeting. "You don't think…"

"Who else could it be?" Davy asked.

"Uh, look, if Babyface Morales is in there… The last time we met, he ended up back in prison. He's not gonna want to see me." Micky gulped, loosening his shirt collar. "I kind of… impersonated him. And led the police to him."

"Well, isn't that dumb," Forty-Two grunted. "You don't lead police to gangsters! You'll get yourself killed!"

"We know!" Micky and Davy said at the same time. Davy hadn't even been there, but he still understood the gravity of the situation. Micky had been uneasy for days - looking over his shoulder, making sure all the doors were locked, actually watching the news instead of making fun of the anchor's enormous nose… It took a lot to shake Micky up, so Davy definitely grasped the danger of it all.

"What do you wanna do?" Davy finally asked.

Micky didn't say anything for awhile. "Well, we gotta… We gotta go in there and rescue Mike and Peter." With a decisive nod, punctuated by the closing of his car door, he started forward.

Davy and Forty-Two looked at each other, closed the other door, and followed.

There were a few tense minutes as they hurried through the open area between the Mustang and the black van. Micky honestly didn't feel too much better when they finally reached it, either, since they were that much closer to Babyface Morales, and had a much worse chance of escape as a result. His hearing also seemed to have decided it was going to detect every single noise anyone made, no matter how small, which led to him jumping nearly a mile when the demon and his bandmate finally caught up with him. When the street lamp above them buzzed and sputtered, he squeaked out, "What was that!?"

Forty-Two pointed up.

"Oh, okay, good."

Nearby, a cricket chirped, and Micky again demanded, "What was _that!?_"

"Crickets, Micky! Bugs! Come on now, pull yourself together. We beat Babyface once, we can do it again!" Davy patted him on the shoulder. "Remember, like you said? We're the good guys." Smiling, he started to peek around the van to see if the coast was clear, when he came face-to-face with the business end of someone's firearm.

His eyes followed the length of the barrel, and then glanced upward into the angry eyes of its owner.

Davy whimpered, "Where's Mike when you need 'im?"

"Who's askin', Squirt?" the armed man demanded.

Davy squeaked, arms going up, palms facing the assailant to show that he had no weapons - or that he was terrified out of his mind - it was always hard to be sure.

Micky peered around the van, too, eyes widening when he saw what had Davy so worried. His face fell as his fight-or-flight instinct kicked in, strongly urging him to run away as quickly as humanly possible. Of course, he wasn't faster than a bullet, which meant that running would probably just end with him being shot.

By none other than Tony Ferano.

"You!" Tony exclaimed, lowering the weapon just a hair. It was enough for Micky to take the opportunity to pull Davy backward and away from the gun.

"Hey, Tony. How're you doin'?" Micky asked as conversationally as he could, while his voice wavered, betraying his fear.

"None of that, eh? We ain't buddies." He lowered the weapon a little bit further, holding up a yellowed envelope instead. "Good thing I was out here to deliver this, 'else no one mighta seen ya."

Smiling with a wicked grin, he held out the envelope as Forty-Two also peered around the van to see what was going on. Micky reached over Davy's shoulder, hand hesitating in front of the envelope and pulling back just slightly. His mind kept screaming that it was some sort of trap - that if he took it, something bad would happen, although he couldn't even begin to guess what that could possibly be. Fire? Explosives? Deadly ants? Maybe Tony needed both his hands to fire that gun, and if Micky took the letter…

"Hey, c'mon! I ain't gonna bite. It's a ransom note. Just read it so's I can take you to the boss!" Tony impatiently jammed the envelope into Micky's hand, and the curly-haired boy staggered backwards. If not for Forty-Two being there, he probably would have fallen over.

"Uh, sure, Tony," Micky muttered, staring at the name on the front. It had been addressed specifically to him. "Give us a minute, okay? Just… Go stand over there or somethin'?"

Davy's arms were still up, though he gave his housemate a look over his shoulder that clearly questioned Micky's sanity.

"You don't give me orders, Dolenz!" Tony insisted, leveling the gun on them.

Taking a chance, Micky stepped forward, pushing the barrel of the gun into the air. Tony, befuddled by this brazen disregard for personal safety (and what should have been a very obvious hierarchy) stared blankly at the three boys in front of him. Smiling, Micky said, "Look, if you want us to read your little love letter, stop pointing a gun at us and go…" He motioned with his hand, "…wait over there, by the street light or somethin'."

It probably was the confusion at this turn-around that ultimately caused Tony to comply, although the gangster wasn't particularly happy about it. He half backed away, and half sidled across the broken parking lot, his eyes never leaving the trio. Micky found a little relief in the fact that the gun was at least pointed at the ground, but that still didn't mean his knees would stop shaking.

"What's it say?" the demon whispered. As Micky tore open the envelope, Davy finally lowered his arms.

"An' who's he callin' 'Squirt?'" Davy asked. "He's hardly bigger'n I am! I bet I could take 'im if he didn't have a weapon."

"But he _does_ have a weapon," Micky noted. "So let's not give him an excuse to use it, all right?" He pulled the letter out of the envelope and held it out so that the others could read it, too.

/DEAR MIKAY AND GEENIY,

WE HAVE MIKE N AND PEDAR TROK. IF U EVR WANT TO SEE THEMS AGAIN, BRING TEH GEENY TO FRENDLEES INDRUSTRAL CLENNING BY SUNRISE TOMOROW OR WE WILL BE HAVE CHIKINS FOR DINNER.

P.S. I AM WORREED ABUT PEDAR TROK HE IS SAD. PLEEZ HURRY./

After a moment of silence, Davy said, "Well, that's just sick, that is."

"What, the whole chicken dinner thing?" Micky asked. "Mike's not too happy about that, either, I'm guessing."

"No - the whole thing where they got someone who can't spell to write a ransom letter. That's not your standard Queen's English."

"You done over there yet?" Tony called.

Micky held up a hand and made a rather rude gesture with it. Tony went back to staring at the ground.

"Guys, what are we gonna do?" Micky asked. "We can't exactly just drag Forty-Two in there. I mean, he's one of us. He's our friend."

"I don't know about friend— " the demon started to say, although it was so quiet that Micky missed it all together, and cut him off.

"So, look, I think if one of us manages to get behind Tony and distract him, the other one can grab the gun, and— What?"

Davy was already shaking his head. The plan was so flawed that it bordered on stupid, a fact of which Micky was well aware. Even so, he wasn't too keen on giving the genie to Babyface, so they had to do something.

"Hey, listen to me," Forty-Two said.

"What if we get behind the van, and before he catches up, we run around the building?" Davy suggested.

Scratching his chin, Micky said, "Running around does tend to inexplicably work pretty well for us a lot…" He trailed off for a moment, taking a look at their immediate surroundings. There weren't a lot of places to hide or run to, unfortunately. "Buildings like this usually have a basement of some sort. Like a cellar. Or an electrical closet or something. I bet if we could find that…"

"We could wait 'til he passed, then jump 'im," Davy said. "Brilliant. I say we go for it."

"GUYS!" Forty-Two yelled. Surprised by the normally soft-spoken genie's shout, Davy and Micky focused on the spot where he'd been, only to find that he'd somehow escaped their care. A quick search revealed him standing next to Tony, the gun pressed between his shoulders. Despite this, he was waving. "I thought maybe I'd just turn myself in. Save you the trouble. It's me they're after, anyway."

"Typical," Davy muttered. "I'm not even sure how to hang a lantern on how cliche that is!"

"I think you just did," Micky replied. "And he ruined what would have been a stellar romp, to boot."

They looked at each other, eyes meeting. Micky noticed that Davy looked slightly annoyed, and quite a bit resigned… And since the drummer felt the same way, he was almost certain that they were thinking the same thing. "We goin' along for the ride, then?" Davy asked.

"Don't think we have much of a choice," Micky said. "Shall we?"

Davy shrugged, raising his hands and sauntering toward Tony and the demon. With a sigh, Micky followed closely after.

—-

Forty-Two had a Plan.

Although not entirely sure how he would execute it, he had a fallback stored up his sleeve, which he was certain would save them all. Maybe. Possibly. The only thing that worried him at the moment was that Micky and Davy decided to tag along, but that seemed typical of mortals. He'd been told before that humans couldn't quite grasp the immortality of a demon, and using a guise of weakness or innocence remained the singular best way to lure a victim to their demise. In this case, it certainly worked against their favor, although Forty-Two never intended for that to happen.

"You should have just left," the demon hissed, eyes narrowing at the other two. Tony pushed them along, through a cramped hallway. "I could save Peter and Mike and get out of there. Now I gotta worry about you two!"

"You're just a kid," Davy said. "Look, we weren't gonna leave you at their mercy."

"I'm not a kid!"

Micky put his hand on Forty-Two's shoulder. "Look, we just care about ya, that's all. If you're in this, we all are. And what's the use of arguing? It's too late for us to back out now, anyway."

At a right angle in the hallway, Tony grabbed one of Forty-Two's wrists and snapped one end of a pair of handcuffs around it, closing them as tightly as possible. The metal pinched his skin, which drew a wince from the genie, but otherwise didn't particularly worry him. Steel was a breakable thing, especially when he put his plan into action. As Micky started to protest, Forty-Two held up his hand, one end of the chain dangling down against his arm, to silence him.

Eventually, the hallway opened up into an enormous box-like room, which was filled with various industrial equipment and a few more thugs. Occupying most of the floor space were gigantic cylindrical holding tanks, with walkways all around them. The entire thing seemed as if it had been out of commission for months, or possibly even years - nothing had any shine or shimmer to it anymore. Instead, there was a layer of dust and grime on almost everything, with most of the machinery being covered by thick dropcloths. It seemed like a waste of time to cover everything, if no one ever intended to come back to this place.

Adding to the eerie emptiness of the facility were a handful of overhead lights, which sputtered and dimmed just as much as the street lamps outside. Half of them weren't functioning at all, and at least one circuit appeared to be completely non-functional, leaving an entire corner in complete darkness. A row of catwalks all around the entire factory and over the tanks created long, dark shadows, which criss-crossed the floor at perfect intervals, making the entire thing look like a prison.

In the middle of it all stood the ringleader.

Tony shoved the genie forward so unexpectedly that Forty-Two tripped, falling forward, and sprawled on the floor in front of Babyface. Glancing upward, the boy faltered as he tried to right himself, his feet deciding they didn't quite want to work properly anymore. Finally, he stood, facing Micky's exact replica with a mixture of trepidation and awe.

"I know you," the demon whispered. "You were the talk of the underworld for weeks. One of the greatest tricks any demon's ever pulled — "

Babyface's lip curled, and Tony took a step forward. The boss, however, held up one hand.

Forty-Two could see through the transformation, his eyes searching over the young man's face with pity. What a horrible thing to do to a young girl. "Katya? Katalina Serov?" He reached forward, cool fingers touching the forever-altered face. Clearly, this was why the gangster brought him here - to fix something that had been destroyed many years ago. To put right a great wrong…

For a single moment, Forty-Two saw hope in those hazel eyes. An escape. "Just make the wish, Katalina. It's yours."

But Babyface grabbed the demon's wrist, holding it in a vice-grip, and looked at the handcuff. "This. This is your bind. And this is my wish - that you bind yourself to me. You help no one but me. You do what I say, when I say it. Forever."

The genie tried to pull away, but the wish was already made. The handcuff glowed, and sealed the binding to it, despite the protests from Micky and Davy behind him. "I didn't agree! Do you know what you've _done!?_" Forty-Two demanded angrily. Curse everything! He would never be able to shift to his true form with an unbreakable bind around his arm! "You've wasted your one chance!"

"It's been years!" the man shouted, his chuckling voice echoing through the facility. "Years I've had to live like this. I stopped carin' so long ago, it don't even matter anymore." With a pointed look to Tony, whose eyes were narrowed dangerously, Babyface added, "I'm king here. This is my world. Whatever you think I wanted… You were wrong."

Defeated, Forty-Two looked toward the floor, muttering something in Russian.

The look in the Babyface's eyes turned from triumphant to shocked, but the expression lasted only a moment, before his attention went elsewhere.

He looked toward Micky, who stared back quite intently. Surely he'd heard some of the exchange - enough to know that the two of them weren't just accidental twins. Smiling, Babyface approached his double, meeting his eyes. "You know what these things do to people?" he purred, his nose just inches away from Micky's. "They take your fondest wish, the thing you want more than anything else, and _twist it._ That's all they're good for. You're better without this thing."

Forty-Two found himself compelled to follow behind Babyface, which meant he was quite close when he saw what happened next.

Micky spit in the mob boss' face.

Enraged, Babyface grabbed Micky by the collar and gave him a good shake. As Davy attempted to separate the two of them, Tony threw the shorter Monkee to the floor, and held him at gunpoint while his boss used a sleeve to wipe his face. Forty-Two was sure that this would be the end for his two companions; even as he tested the limits of his new bind, he wasn't sure he'd be able to do anything to help them. All he could manage was picking Davy up off the floor.

"Put 'em with the others, Tony, 'til I'm thinkin' rational again," Babyface finally growled, letting go of Micky's collar. The drummer sputtered, breathing again.

Wordlessly, Tony led them away, leaving Forty-Two only slightly relieved behind them. He did manage a slight smile when Davy looked back over his shoulder, although the glance didn't last long.

"Well, well, well," Babyface said, once the others were out of earshot.

Eyes narrowed, the demon turned. "Look, I didn't do this to you. You're not punishing anyone except yourself with that wish you made."

"I've found the perfect way to keep a demon leashed," Babyface said. "I'm pretty sure a genie'll come in handy, no matter what we do. An endless stream of people, all kissin' my feet and wishin' for everything I could ever dream of." Smirking, he added, "And I've specifically selected your bind for its convenience and tenacity. I'm sure you can understand why."

Forty-Two had to admit, it was a smart move. An indestructible bind wrapped around an indestructible demon.

The gangster's grin only grew wider as he pulled a chain out of his neatly-pressed shirt, upon which dangled the handcuff's key.

Admittedly, Forty-Two had never felt so helpless in his very, very long life.


	10. Chapter 10

Micky wiggled.

All that stored up energy in his feet made it necessary. With a pretty frightening firearm pressed to his back, he knew his body was trying to help him, producing copious adrenaline in order to ready a flight-or-fight response. Every one of his senses felt heightened, from his vision to his sense of smell; every single nerve synapse was firing in unison, so much so that he wondered if it was possible for a human being to short himself out. Like most people, though, Micky occasionally functioned on logic rather than instinct. If he ran, he'd be shot. If he allowed Tony to lead him forward, he'd be able to unite with Mike and Peter, and then they'd have four minds to put together instead of just two, which might result in some idea regarding their triumphant escape.

It seemed Davy had roughly the same idea, although the Englishman was slightly more vocal about it. "'ey, a little courtesy goes a long way, y'know," he spat as Tony gave him a shove. "I'm movin', just lemme go at my own pace— "

Micky paid attention to his surroundings, though, as Davy kept Tony distracted. They worked in perfect tandem, an unspoken plot forming between the two. Micky, ever the quick thinker, kept uncharacteristically silent as he took stock of what they had to work with, while Davy talked circles around the mostly uneducated gangster, prompting Tony to ask on occasion, "What did you just say?"

They reached the edge of one of the large tanks. Some dizzying distance down, Peter stared up at them, worry etched on his face.

Tony lowered a ladder into the hollow, holding the weapon on them. "All right, you punks. Get on in there."

Despite the fact that he was shaking so violently that he could barely hold onto the rungs, Micky miraculously found the strength to climb from one floor to the other. At the bottom, he held onto the ladder as Davy descended, but the shorter man's climb was interrupted when Tony let loose a single shot. Davy, so startled by the blast, let go, and crashed into Micky's arms. As they both fell backward, Tony pulled the ladder out of the tank, quickly placing it out of their reach. A moment later, he disappeared from view.

"You okay?" Micky asked. He winced as Davy pressed an elbow into his chest in an attempt to right himself.

"Yeah, I think so."

Peter hurried to help them up, followed by the tiny form of a black prairie chicken. "What are you guys doing here?" the blonde asked. Mike said something, and Peter added, "How did you even find us?"

"It's a long story," Micky muttered. As he pushed himself to his feet, he clutched at his chest as the air rushed back into his lungs. Having someone land on you, even someone whose nickname was 'Tiny,' tended to knock the wind right out of you. "Oh, and thanks for landing on me, Davy. That was helpful.

"Well, if you hadn't broken my fall, I mighta broken _meself,_" Davy grumped. It was a disguised thank you, as well as an apology. As it was, Davy's one elbow was pretty badly scraped up. Peter handed him a torn strip of sheet material, which quickly turned red when pressed against the wound.

Micky took a few steps until he could breathe regularly again, then leaned over, his hands on his knees. "I was gonna suggest we stand on each other and make a human ladder to get out of here," he said. "But that's not gonna work. Babyface has got his men watchin' this tank, and we're gonna get shot if we so much as peek over the top."

"Besides that, Mike's out of commission, and I'm probably too short to be of much use," Davy said, as Peter helped him tie the strip of cloth around his arm.

It certainly was a dismal day when Davy made short jokes about himself.

Without much hope, Micky finally flopped down onto the floor of the tank, lying back. For a moment, he stared up at the ceiling, feeling as though its sputtering fluorescent lights were laughing at them all. When the brightness became too much to stare at, he turned his head to the side. Michael stood nearby, apparently checking him over to make sure he was all right.

Smiling, Micky said, "I'm fine, Mike. Relatively speaking." Noticing the fact that the chicken was wrapped up like a mummy, he asked, "What happened to you?"

"They were afraid Mike would try to fly out of here," Peter said. "So they popped his wing out so he couldn't…"

Mike shuddered, his feathers puffing up around the bandage.

((_It's feelin' a lot better now,_)) Mike said, as Peter translated.

"Brutes," Davy grunted. "Pickin' on someone who can't fight back." He sat down, too, and as Michael tottered over to make sure he was okay, as well, Davy scratched under his chin. Resigned, perhaps because of the hellish day he'd had so far, Mike actually allowed it. Micky chuckled.

Davy and Micky went on to describe everything that had happened to lead them to the abandoned factory, starting with Forty-Two's preparation of the chicken sacrifice - and what, exactly, it was for - to the supermarket adventure, and even the wish for the car. Mike and Micky had to break the story so that they could talk at length about how amazingly awesome the Mustang was.

"Her name's Matilda," Micky said.

((_That's a perfect name. What color?_))

"Green. It's like Forty-Two read my mind."

Finally, Davy had to say, "Peter, stop translating for Mike so we can get back on topic."

"Aw, there's not much more to tell," Micky said. "We talked to the kid at the store, and Davy flirted with some chick, then we ended up here." He paused. "I mean, there's a bit more to it than that, but that's the gist."

((_And then y'got yerselves caught,_)) Mike said. He was quiet for awhile, before he sighed. ((_Fellas, we got an obligation to put things right. Here's my plan._))

—-

A genie. His captive.

Perhaps years ago, Babyface would have wished himself back to his old self upon catching such an amazing creature. But he'd built a life now, and while it wasn't exactly a perfect existence, he enjoyed it enough. It was dangerous and adventurous, something he never would have gotten as a woman scraping through an impoverished living in Russia.

Sometimes he wondered if he was so traumatized by going from female to male that his entire personality became something unrecognizable. There were other factors, though, that led him into this violent life, such as the intervention of his new father, Kolya. A new name. Desensitization to things that would make a normal person cringe. He couldn't go back to being Katalina now, he told himself. Clearly, he'd made the right choice by binding the genie to himself, and because of that choice, he was well on his way to becoming the most powerful man in the country. Maybe in the world.

As his mind drifted to the old adage of not counting his chickens before they were hatched, he thought about his captives, and what he would have to do with them. Letting them go would make him seem weak, even though Babyface had everything from them that he needed. No, he'd have to kill them. Even his twin.

For now, he was going to have a conversation with his demon. Crouching down in front of it, he looked the boy over. He seemed so weak in this guise, with his too-large clothing and one handcuff dangling from a thin wrist. There was power behind this creature, though. Malice. Intelligence.

"How did you know?" Babyface asked.

"What? How I knew who you were?" Forty-Two replied. "Does it matter?"

"I guess not."

The boy sat on the cold floor of the factory, his knees pulled up to his chest. Now and then, pale blue eyes would glance upward, glaring. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Babyface realized that he was doing something incredibly stupid, keeping a demon chained like this, but he had to appear strong among his men. After all, they constantly had their doubts about his command, as all gangsters tended to do. Every moment was another chance for a power play. How could they even think to usurp him again if he'd tamed a creature of such incredible power?

"It wasn't me that did this to you, you know," Forty-Two said. "You don't have to take it out on me."

Babyface shrugged. "You were in the wrong place at the wrong time, kid. Don't matter to me what genie I catch. You're gonna be a hell of an asset."

Out of the corner of his eye, he noticed Tony approaching, weapon held down at his side. It would have been easy just to have Tony kill the kids and get the deed done and over with, but something still bothered Babyface in the back of his mind about the whole thing. It didn't seem right to kill Micky, for one thing. And the others were just collateral damage. Perhaps there was a way to free them without seeming weak in front of his underlings. For now, though, he intended to make use of his genie's power.

"Tony. Get over here, would ya?" He stood, smirking at the blond-haired kid on the floor. "C'mon, Tony, we're gonna test out this thing, see how it works."

Obediently, his second in command sauntered forward, though not without an irritated grimace. Maybe his reluctance would change when he saw how rich Babyface intended to make them. They wouldn't be hanging out at the Purple Pelican anymore, that was for sure. Instead, they'd have some sort of amazing suite somewhere. Maybe a penthouse restaurant with a view of the whole city. Waiters serving them without concern for their own well-being, twenty-four hours a day. They'd be wealthy beyond any of their wildest dreams. All thanks to their fearless leader. They'd never doubt him again.

Or else.

"You're gonna use your wish, Tony. I want you to wish for gold," Babyface said.

Tony seemed reluctant, biting his lip. Briefly, he met Babyface's eyes, then quickly looked away. "What if that's not what I wanna wish for, Boss?"

"Who's in charge here?"

Tony thought about this for another moment, probably weighing his options. On one hand, he could just go ahead and wish for gold. On the other, he could wish for something else entirely, and possibly end up dead for his disobedience. Nonchalantly, Babyface allowed one hand to stray toward his firearm, tucked in his belt.

"Fine, fine. How much?"

Babyface shrugged. "I'm just showing off my new demon. Don't matter to me."

Tony looked at the boy, who glared upward. Despite the expression, there was a tiny smirk on Forty-Two's face as he waited. Tony, apparently uncomfortable, scuffed one toe on the floor, before finally deciding. "All right. I want a briefcase full of gold."

Immediately, the briefcase appeared, just a couple feet off the ground. In remained suspended in the air for a second or two, surrounded by a shimmering, blue cloud, before it dropped to the floor with a thud. The noise echoed through the entire factory for a heartbeat, before leaving the entire facility in silence.

It lay on the floor on one side.

"Well? Open it!" Babyface commanded.

Tony seemed a little disoriented by the whole thing. After all, briefcases generally didn't appear out of thin air, and if this one was full of gold… Well, then he'd just have to admit that Babyface had a good plan. Maybe the ungrateful little peon would stop whining so much about how he'd be a much better leader. The shorter man shuffled toward it, eying the case as if it were a rabid animal.

"Stop stalling!" Babyface shouted.

Quickly, Tony popped open the case. Soon after, he stumbled backward so quickly that he fell on his backside. Even then, he continued pushing himself away, pointing. "That ain't gold! Them's dead goldfish, Boss!"

Forty-Two laughed, and Babyface distinctly felt a chill run up his spine.

—-

Mike wouldn't call this a horrible plan, because he'd carefully, intricately woven it together by himself. Based on the information he got from Micky, as well as his own deductions of the situation, he'd come to several conclusions which he was sure would lead them all out of this mess. Unfortunately, he'd still be a chicken, but he honestly hoped that someone would be able to take care of that little problem after everything was said and done.

That being said, this was a horrible plan.

The only way he could figure to get out of the tank was a previously ignored half-broken inlet grate. After Micky and Peter tore the grate off the rest of the way, they revealed a pipe, which was just large enough for Mike to fit into, provided the bandage was removed from around him. And that's where he was now, the metallic sides of the pipe pressing in all around him, the scent of chlorine almost overpowering, and the pain from his dislocated shoulder threatening to bring tears to his eyes. If he had the ability to cry, of course.

Mike really hoped this led somewhere, because the lay of his feathers meant he couldn't back up if he hit a dead end.

When he had that small, insignificant thought, everything that had happened to him finally caught up with his mind. He remembered the uncomfortable transformation with painful clarity. Distraught, he then went on a roller coaster of hope and despair before finally giving into his feelings and crying about the whole thing. He could very well be facing the rest of his life as a chicken, but even that seemed okay, if his being in this form could somehow help the others escape. Michael still had to take care of them, after all… It gave him purpose, and helped him stop thinking about how he was living his very own horror movie.

Eventually, he hit an incline. The pipe turned at ninety degrees, and then ascended at a forty-five degree angle. It would have been a steep climb, if not for the fact that he was pretty well enclosed on all sides. The pipe itself held him in place.

He began to worry as he climbed. What if the other end of this thing led to a sealed grate? He'd never be able to escape.

Someone would cut him out. The guys would think of something. They'd get him out.

Pushing those thoughts aside, he continued onward, a couple inches at a time. It seemed to take forever to get to the top of the rise, but eventually, he found himself crawling forward on a more level surface. He also saw light ahead of him, which meant that he was hopefully coming upon the exit to this claustrophobic tunnel.

At the end, he found what once would have been a connection for a hose, probably to pipe raw materials into the tank. Whatever had covered it before was thankfully long gone, and while the opening was a little smaller than the pipe itself, he was able to squeeze through it, albeit with a little pain. His shoulder kept wanting to pop back out again, but Peter's quick thinking and care ensured that the injury was mostly stable.

Outside, he found himself at the far end of the platform circling the tanks. The lights were off here, either to save energy, or because they no longer worked. It didn't really matter in light of the fact that none of Babyface's goons were down here to bother him. Like Micky said, though, a whole lot of them were stationed around their particular tank.

They all had guns.

((_There was a deer with one eye,_)) he muttered to himself. If he could keep talking, maybe he wouldn't let the fear consume him. All he needed to do was create a distraction. Then Micky could lasso the ladder into the tank.

((_She'd graze with the sea to her blind side._)) Carefully, he kept his sharp talons from tapping on the metal flooring. It wasn't easy.

((_She thought that no danger could possibly come from the water, which left her good eye facing the land, watching for hunters._))

He walked slowly, eyes constantly flitting toward the gangsters. They didn't seem particularly occupied with looking for escapees coming from another direction. Their attention was pretty much solely focused on the tank, where Micky, Davy, and Peter were waiting for him to give the signal. Like he'd shown Peter in the car, he could make quite a loud noise if he needed to, and that would be their cue to get the hell out of there.

((_One day, some men came by in a boat, and shot her from the water._))

He reached the end of the platform. Looking down, he could see Babyface shouting at the demon.

((_As she lay dying…_))

He raised his arm and struck the boy. And despite the fact that the demon was an ageless, evil creature, Mike couldn't tolerate that. He couldn't allow that to happen. Somewhere along the line, Forty-Two became more than just some genie.

((_She mourned her fate. Wishing she'd paid more attention to the water._))

He stretched his wings. There was some pain, certainly, but he should be able to glide down, right? He tested their strength, flexing them a couple times and ignoring the hurt.

((_Danger comes from the direction you least expect._))

With a deep breath, he launched himself into the nothingness in front of him. His wings caught the air, and then his body took over, steering him in exactly the direction he wanted to go. For a brief moment, he felt amazingly giddy - he was flying! It was the most amazing sensation in the world! Then, he hooked his talons into the gangster's face, and the good feeling vanished as abruptly as it had appeared.

"Mike?" he heard the demon say. "The key! GET THE KEY!"

There were arms flying at him. Someone grabbed his tail and gave a good pull, but with his claws embedded into Babyface's shoulder, he wouldn't be dislodged. He searched for the key and found it, hanging from a thin, golden chain around the gangster's neck. Grabbing it with his beak, and hoping that the chain was as cheap as it looked, he jumped from his perch, and the chain broke, sending the key bouncing across the floor.

Mike started after it, but something struck him, and he was flying again. The wall came at him far too quickly to avoid.

—-

"I kicked it!" Babyface screamed. "Don't worry about the chicken, Tony! GET THE KEY!"

But it was too late for that, because the key was safely in Forty-Two's clutches. He held it up, smiling, showing his teeth as he undid the binding. He dropped the handcuffs, allowing a hellish, powerful energy to flow through him, shedding the skin of the mortal child. He didn't like people to see him this way, but sometimes it was necessary. Sometimes, he had a score to settle.

Almost eight feet tall, Forty-Two's bipedal, goatlike physiology was fairly intimidating. The horns atop his head were almost half his height, and had razor-sharp outer edges. Honestly, they made him a little self-conscious among the other demons, because they tended to run into things, like low doorways or party decorations. They were also pretty heavy. At the moment, though, they added to his threatening demeanor, so he wasn't too angry with them at the moment.

He leaped forward, grabbing Babyface in a headlock. His orange eyes stared at Tony, and his lips parted to reveal a blue, forked tongue. He hissed, and as a collective, all the mob boss's minions fled from the area. The smell of fear taunted him; Forty-Two forgot how much he loved the scent, how he had to feed off of it sometimes just to survive. It was pungent - the scent of sweat and urine and mortality trailed after the terrified gangsters as they made their escape.

"You're bound!" Babyface squeaked. "You're bound to help me! To— to do whatever I ask!"

"Oh, sure," Forty-Two purred. "But you never said I couldn't also _hurt_ you." He chuckled. In a way, he hated this side of himself, but the fear was so intoxicating. "And when you die, your soul will be my plaything for the rest of your afterlife."

"Please, no…"

"Destroy the binding."

"I — I wish— "

"It's not a wish! FREE ME, OR I'LL TAKE YOUR SOUL RIGHT NOW!"

Forty-Two honestly wasn't completely sure what Babyface stammered, but the cosmos must have heard something along the lines of a bind-breaking request. The handcuffs glowed white-hot for a single moment, and the demon could feel the compulsion to serve the gangster leaving him. He wondered if, perhaps, that was the shortest bind in the history of all binds.

A pile of ash sat where the bind had been.

"Now. Leave," Forty-Two demanded.

Without the bind, which he himself had twisted, he couldn't really do anything to Babyface. The mobster's fear was so powerful, though, that he fled, just like the others had done.

The demon heard a loud crash nearby, coming from the direction of the large tanks, but he wasn't concerned with that at the moment. Forty-Two's attention focused on the prairie chicken nearby, who lay twisted in the floor, unmoving. Hurrying over, he hovered one hoof-like hand over Michael; the demon's claws sparked, and suddenly lit up like a torch. Wincing, Forty-Two bowed his head.

Footsteps echoed against the sheet metal floor. When the demon looked up, Michael's three friends stood nearby, looking down. "Micky managed to pull the ladder in to the tank," Davy breathed, kneeling next to Michael. "So now we're all together, we can do this thing. We can make you mortal and fix this whole mess."

They didn't seem very concerned at his true form. Forty-Two tilted his head at Micky.

"It's the horns, man," the drummer said. "You said you'd wish for smaller horns. We kinda figured it was you."

Smiling sadly, Forty-Two looked down at the small, feathered creature. "I can't fix it," he said.

"But…" Peter said, his voice almost a whine. "You said…"

Interrupting, Forty-Two whispered, "Michael's dead."


	11. Chapter 11

"Dead? No. No, he can't…" Peter reached for Michael, who somehow looked a lot smaller than he already was. His feathers seemed greyer. His eyes were partially open, staring at nothing.

As Peter picked him up, Micky reached over, too, and gave the chicken a shake, as if this would just wake him up. None of them seemed to know what to do, or how to react.

Once Micky realized that Mike wasn't waking up, he pulled his hand back as if he'd stuck it right in the blue fire held in Forty-Two's hand. Wide-eyed, shocked, he glanced wildly at the others. "Wh— what are we gonna do? He— his family— I mean, they— No, he can't be dead. Mike! Michael, come on, man, this isn't funny."

Davy's eyes were fixed on nothing as he grabbed Micky's shoulders, preventing the drummer from giving the body another shake. Maybe he'd already accepted it, or maybe he hadn't allowed it to quite sink in just yet. To Forty-Two, Davy was always sort of a wildcard - at various points, he was either as down-to-earth as Michael, or as up-in-the-clouds as Micky.

Peter was already allowing the truth to sink in, tears gathering in his eyes and spilling down his face. He hugged the still-warm body close to himself; it was strange to see that ever-present optimism fall apart. Nothing would be okay now, his actions seemed to say. Nothing will work out for the best, the game is over, and we didn't win.

So, there was a choice.

The decision ended up being surprisingly easy for the demon. His talons curled around the azure fire in his hand, holding it fast to earth.

"I've got him. Here." His tone was clipped, but deep and resonating. Despite his natural form's relatively small size, his voice echoed unnaturally through the vacated factory. Nodding at the fire, Forty-Two forced a smile. "I'm keeping him from moving toward the Light, but I can't hold him forever. And if some other demon gets a whiff of an imprisoned soul, they're gonna want it, so we don't have much time."

"…You can save 'im?" Davy quickly asked.

"Peter, you have a wish left," Forty-Two said. He wanted to answer Davy, to explain everything, but there just wasn't enough time.

"But you said you couldn't … Couldn't do something to — I mean — " Peter fumbled over the words, but it was hard to miss the hope in his grey-blue eyes.

"You need to do it now. Make the wish."

Compared with Micky's highly detailed and complex order for a car, Peter's was simple, to the point, and heart-rending: "Fix him."

Being more specific wasn't necessary, though. Really, it was up to the genie to twist the wish - or not - and in this case, Forty-Two had done more than enough damage to last several lifetimes. He was going to make this right, he was going to do exactly what they wanted him to do. He was going to fix this mess.

"I'll need some room."

Peter set Michael down - reluctantly - and he and the others backed away a little, sitting on the floor. Hope had returned to their eyes, and Forty-Two wasn't about to disappoint them.

All demons had an incredible amount of power. Infinite, some would say. Bindings existed to prevent abuse of that power, but it never meant that those abilities were taken away. A demon could change rank, after all, or request a new set of bindings to adapt to his job.

He sunk he claws into the soul, eyes closing, communicating with it on a very basic level. Souls were tricky things, after all - neither living nor dead, since the spirit of anything couldn't exist in either state. It would continue on in this partially sentient form until the Light took it to its destination, and wasn't accustomed to accepting orders from a demon. Forty-Two didn't mean to hurt what was essentially Michael's very essence, but his claws scratched the surface, causing it to register a tremor of pain before it agreed not to follow the Light off the mortal coil.

And that's when the demon began to heal it.

Rearranging the body came first. In its present state, it couldn't live, so he knit broken bones, repaired destroyed blood vessels, and replaced various wrecked bits of internal anatomy. It wasn't perfect, but it would be enough so that the soul wouldn't reject it as a home.

He pulled the fire downward, and it disappeared.

Slowly, the chicken began to look less like a chicken. Feathers melted into skin or became hair. Michael's limbs lengthened and regained their proper numbers of fingers and toes. It didn't take long before he went from less than a foot in height to his normal six-foot-one, during which his face reformed its proper features.

It was Micky who realized that his bandmate and friend had no clothes. Before the former chicken could awaken and suffer embarrassment, the drummer quickly stood up, pulling another dropcloth off one of the machines, and covered Mike with it.

Humans and their taboos.

Abruptly, Michael gasped, sitting up and nearly shaking the sheet off himself in a desperate attempt to get to his feet. Before he could do so, though, Peter reached for him, one hand closing around the other man's upper arm. Mike winced in pain, since that was his damaged shoulder, but at least he stopped trying to run away from whatever it was he felt he needed to escape.

It was like he was frozen, half-crouching and facing away from them, breathing as if he'd just run a marathon. He _would_ feel the need to steal as much oxygen from the air as he could, though, since being dead tended to do that to a person. One didn't really appreciate breathing until one couldn't do it anymore. Between breaths, he trembled, finally shaking himself right off his feet and to his knees. He planted his hands against the floor to steady himself.

After a few moments, Peter said, "Mike, it's okay."

Realizing he was covered with a sheet, Mike looked down at himself, then quickly pulled the cloth more tightly around his shoulders. Chuckling, Peter said again, "It's okay, Mike. You're all right."

Finally, the black-haired young man turned toward the others, and, surprised, Peter released his arm, scooting backward. The others wore similar shocked expressions, and were met with a questioning, almost hurt look from their recently-transformed friend.

"Your eyes," Davy said.

Mike blinked, still breathing heavily. "Hh… whh— "

"Take it easy, huh? You're not used to talking yet, buddy," Micky said. "Your eyes are glowing."

Surprised, Mike arched his eyebrows.

"And orange," Peter added.

Looking quite exhausted, Forty-Two managed a smile on his goat-like face. "Yeah, when you have a demon's claws in your soul, there tend to be a few… side effects. It's like a scar. It'll diminish over the next few years."

"Y— ye—years?" Mike stuttered, turning his attention to Forty-Two. He narrowed his eyes, which were now the same pupil-less, sunset-colored eyes of the demon. It also didn't escape the astute young man that their friendly neighborhood genie looked a lot different than he did before. "Are… you…?"

"Yeah, it's me. Pretty cool, huh?"

Mike nodded, weakly.

"So," Micky said. "How bad is it gonna be for you, Forty-Two, breakin' the rules and all?"

The demon was quiet, tired, looking at the floor. Several times, he started to speak, but every time, he couldn't quite find gentle enough words to tell them. Maybe he could spare them the awful truth and tell them something less severe? But no, he owed it to them, after everything they'd been through. "The punishment is the same for any broken bind. As we speak, I'm being judged by the angels. I'll stop existing."

"They'll kill you? For that?" Davy asked, incredulous. But it was the knowing realization on Peter's face - horrified, destroyed, beyond saddened - that brought a sad smile back to Forty-Two's face.

"To die would mean I'd be sent back to hell. No, I'm going to be erased from existence. My consciousness, my thoughts, my future… There will be nothing left."

That was a lot to give up, and by the wide-eyed look on his face, Mike had realized it. At least if Mike was allowed to die, he would have continued existing in some form, even if it was out of the reach of his friends. Forty-Two's punishment - the only one administered by angels upon demons - would be far worse. Even so, he felt peaceful. It was the right thing to do. He should have done it from the start.

"'m not worth it. Take it back," Mike whimpered, reaching out for the demon's brown-furred shoulder.

"We could… uh— " Micky shook his head, eyes darting around the factory as he tried to settle on a solution. "Hide you! You just come home with us, we'll— "

He stopped talking.

"Look," Forty-Two said. "I knew what I was doing when I told you to make that wish." He pointedly focused on Peter, who looked exceptionally miserable, having essentially signed the demon's order of execution. "I've been on earth for, what, a few days? And you've made me love you guys. Love, you know? It's pretty awesome." He gently pulled the beads over his head, holding them for a moment, before handing them back to Peter. "It's something you don't really see coming, 'cuz you don't know what you're missing 'til it blindsides you. And then Michael died, and it hurt. And the only way I could think of to stop hurting was to make things right again."

Silence. Then Davy asked, "Did it stop?"

The demon nodded. "Yeah. Yeah, it did."

He added, fear coloring his words, "I need to go now. I'm being summoned."

—-

In the immediate aftermath of the events involving the demon, Michael certainly wasn't himself. The first day after, he hardly spoke at all, in fact, sitting in his bed and staring blankly at nothing. Granted, given what had happened to his eyes, it was hard to tell exactly where he was staring, but Peter knew. There was a certain detachedness apparent around his friend, but it was only to be expected from one who'd died, and had a demon's claws stuck into their soul.

Eventually, Peter got him to talk, to open up about the whole thing. Mike didn't say too much about it initially, except that it was a chapter in his life that he'd never forget. Once out of bed, he meandered pretty aimlessly around the pad, until some of the old spark began to return, little by little.

Mike was changed by the ordeal. Irreversibly. Even so, it wasn't like the dark-haired young man to let his bad experiences rule him. In spite of his recovery, he was still jumpier than normal, he still refused to eat any sort of poultry, and, of course, his eyes glowed a steady, eerie orange wherever he went, but he felt much more at ease as time progressed. Less than a week later, he was back to joking around, practicing with the band, and sleeping through the night. He still complained of nightmares, specifically of a light pulling him in one direction, while thorns hooked around his legs and tugged him the opposite way, but even those became more manageable.

Some time later, Peter discovered Mike standing out on the balcony, looking over the ocean. Despite the fact that it was night, he had his sunglasses perched atop his head. He'd started wearing them around to save people from the weird new appearance of his eyes, but Peter didn't particularly mind what kind of eyes Mike had, so long as they were alive.

Still standing near the door, he made small talk, to break the ice a little. "Micky sold that car he wished for. It'll cover rent and food for a while, at least."

"Almost sad to see her go. It was nice."

Nodding, Peter approached the railing, leaning next to the black-haired young man. "How're you doin'?"

"Oh, sore still. My shoulder especially. The bruises are healing up pretty good, though."

It really wasn't what Peter wanted to know, and he was sure Mike understood that. Physical well-being was one thing, and there could be no doubt that the other musician had really gone through the ringer in that department. Remembering Mike's appearance the first few days after his return from the dead gave Peter a shiver, since there wasn't much of him that wasn't at least a little black and blue.

"I'm still bothered, Pete," Mike added, without prompting.

"It's okay. After what you went through…"

Mike turned toward his friend, eyes leaving a smokey orange trail that dissipated a second later. "Not that. I mean, about what Forty-Two did for me. Ain't right that someone should give up his existence for me."

Peter's shoulders slumped. On one hand, he understood where Mike was coming from, since the blond himself had made the wish. On the other hand, he was selfishly glad for the demon's gift, because it meant that he still had one of his best pals in his life - alive and human.

When Peter said nothing, Mike added, "I figured you'd be the one to talk to about it and all. You're as close to neutral as they get. Micky and Davy would just tell me I was crazy."

"I don't think they would," Peter replied. "Mike, I'm glad you're here. But… But it makes me shiver when I think that he's… Well, he's…"

"He's nowhere. Gone."

There really wasn't that much more to say on the matter, so the two of them just stood there, listening to the ocean. Peter couldn't think of anything to say to make it all right, because Forty-Two's erasure from existence was more than just a sacrifice. Normal heroes made sacrifices. Maybe they died, but that energy that made them a person continued to exist after that, thinking and feeling. What the genie did cut far deeper than that, and he wouldn't even be lauded for it. The most amazing act of altruism ever committed would go unsung for the rest of time.

None of the boys were really okay with that. Even if they were mourning a lowly demon.

Peter tried to be good company, but he had very little to say. All he could really think of to do was stand close by, hoping that the nearness helped Mike in some way. It seemed to. Between that, and the calming crash of the waves, they both relaxed, ignoring whatever commotion they heard from inside the house. It was probably just the other guys walking around anyway, and not something worthy of their pre-occupied attention.

They were eventually disturbed by a soft, muffled series of footsteps behind them, which, thanks to their proximity, piqued the boys' curiosity. They turned at the same time, only to find Micky and Davy standing there, smiling, with the blond-haired, blue-eyed demon in front of them.

Mike actually rubbed his eyes. When he pulled a hand away, an orange trail briefly followed.

"Ah, hang on. Lemme fix that for you. Close your eyes." Forty-Two reached for Mike, who was still too stunned to argue as his hand was taken. He closed his eyes for only a few seconds, before the boy released him, and said, "Okay."

He blinked, looking with confusion to Peter, who pointed excitedly at Mike's eyes. "They're brown again! Hey! Hey, how'd you do that?"

Mike added, "How are you _here?_ We thought…"

"That's what we'd like to know," Davy said. "But he said he wanted to tell us all together."

If Mike ever had a bigger smile on his face, Peter had never seen it. In his glee, the tall guitarist almost stumbled over his own feet as he lunged forward to wrap the boy in a tight hug, which lasted until Forty-Two choked out, "Mike, I can't breathe."

Micky ruffled the kid's hair. "Demons need air?"

Forty-Two laughed. "Well, that's kinda part of what I want to tell you. The whole breaking the rules thing. Ignoring a binding. Rebelling against celestial beings. I came to find out that almost all the angels are former demons who did something extraordinary. You know, enough to pull them out of hell. Uh. I guess I fit the bill." He smirked. "So now I can heal things, like the scratches I left all over Mike's soul."

The others said nothing for a moment, then Peter asked, "You're an angel?"

Smiling, Forty-Two shrugged.

"Congrats!" Micky ventured. "I guess this means no more wish-granting and binding and all that stuff, huh?"

"Ah, well, there are limits." Forty-Two scuffed his toe against the wooded surface of the deck, his smile turning shy. "Angelic tiers. Stuff I still have to learn. But hey, I got an eternity to do it, right? They're starting me out as a guardian angel, I guess. I thought … I thought I'd keep an eye out on you guys, if that's all right."

He was met with silence again, until Mike finally found his voice. "Aw, you can't just walk up to someone and ask if you can be their guardian angel."

"No?" Forty-Two asked, concerned.

"Yeah," Mike said. "Yeah, it's… I guess it's just not done that way."

"Ever. In the history of anything," Micky added.

"Now hang on, I'm just sayin'," Mike said, waving one hand at Micky to quiet him. "We're all friends, and friends, they look out for each other. I mean, that's what love is, right?" He shrugged. "So, you look out for us, and we'll look out for you."

As impossible as it was for four ordinary mortals to look out for an angel, it really was the sentiment that counted in the end, and probably had a lot to do with Mike's hesitance to really rely on anyone. That's just how he was - self-sufficient, protective, _there._ Apparently, this even applied to supernatural beings, like former demons. He put his hand back on the kid's shoulder, smiling. "Looks like we both went through a pretty big change, huh?"

Though Forty-Two's smile diminished, it didn't disappear entirely. "Mike, I'm really sorry."

"For what?"

Confused, the angel narrowed his eyes, first looking at Davy (who could only shrug) to see if his tall friend had forgotten everything, then at Mike himself. "The whole chicken thing, and getting you … you know. Dead."

"Well, son, that's just it. I helped you earn your wings, even if I lost mine." He smiled, lifting up one hand to wiggle his fingers. "And if we had to go through all that to do it, I'm glad to have helped."

Forty-Two threw his arms around Michael, sniffling. "Then, thanks, I guess."

"Are we ever gonna see you again?" Peter found himself asking as Forty-Two backed away, rubbing his eyes.

"I don't know. I don't think so. Part of my binding is that I'm not supposed to appear to mortals. They're letting me break the rules this one time. Special case. I'm gonna miss you, though."

"Well, can you at least stay awhile?" Peter asked, suddenly very sad at the prospect of losing the boy forever, even if he'd be around, watching over their shoulder.

But the angel shook his head. "Nah, I gotta get back. But there's one thing I wanted to ask before I go." He looked at Mike, reaching for the dark-haired man's hand again. "Look, they say I need to pick a name, and I figured I'd go traditional. I mean, I'm no archangel, but… I'm kinda partial to the name 'Michael.' That okay with you?"

It wasn't the first time they'd seen their fearless leader speechless, but this time was different than the others. Mike's expression was hard to read - not quite into the realm of being teary, not quite blank, or stumped. Perhaps reverent would be the proper way to put it, as he stood there, restored light brown eyes staring into the angel's blue. He didn't say anything, only giving an almost imperceptible nod as his answer.

The newly-Christened Michael let go of his namesake's hand, and took a step back. With one last glance around at the others, he vanished, leaving the familiar dusty-blue light behind him, which faded a few seconds later.

**EPILOGUE**

_Your mother still lives,_ the demon told him.

His dreams, his goals, his entire reason for capturing a genie almost completely melted away when he heard those words. Not so much that he sabotaged himself, but enough so that when it seemed all hope was lost, he immediately cut his losses and ran. He had to know.

Babyface found it hard to admit to himself that he'd never stopped being little Katya, that since he found himself thrown into an entirely new life, some measure of fear drove him onward for the next decade and a half. Having left his suit behind, he found clothing more suited to the Russian lower class. Warm, practical, drab and boring.

The Russian springtime wasn't exactly warm - patches of snow still covered the ground in various places, but at least they weren't knee-deep. That alone made it much easier to walk around. Being here, though, constantly reminded him of the cave - of a lying, maniacal demon who'd both saved his life and destroyed it.

What _would_ he look like?

Having asked around, Babyface finally located the Serov household - a meager dwelling where his mother still lived. Admittedly, the house was much better than what she had before - perhaps they'd managed to elevate themselves out of poverty since the horrible turn of events on that winter day.

When he found himself at the door, he hesitated. So many things ran through his head about what he would say…

He knocked, and a moment later, the door opened.

He looked at her with tenderness, but she returned his love with distrust and apprehension. Before she could shut the door in his face, though, Babyface quickly pulled a package out of his pocket. Technically, it was dirty money, but that's how they'd lived their lives when he was younger. His mother wouldn't mind.

"I know your daughter," he told her in Russian. "Katalina Alexandrovna— Please. Here." He handed over the package, meeting her eyes. Babyface told himself that he wouldn't be disappointed when he saw no recognition there, but he couldn't help it, and his face fell. "She is alive and well. She hopes to return one day."

The woman tucked the package under one arm, and allowed a rare smile. Reaching out, she took the stranger's hand, leaning close to whisper, "Then you will tell my Katya that I love her, and look forward to that day."


End file.
